TNT Sports is looking to innovate how viewers watch the French Open.
In its first year covering the event later this month, TNT has announced broadcast plans that will see 30 different on-air talents appear during coverage. That might seem like a lot of people just to cover one tennis tournament, but now we might know part of the reason why.
According to a report by Matthew Futterman in The Athletic, TNT Sports will debut an NFL RedZone style whip-around broadcast of the French Open. The coverage “won’t have separate announce teams on each match, but rather a group in an onsite studio watching the action and talking about it along with everyone else.”
That’s a formula that has worked well for the NFL version, with host Scott Hanson navigating viewers through from key play to key play.
The format seems tailor-made for a Grand Slam tennis event, which can have a dozen matches being played simultaneously. TNT Sports and the French Open aren’t the first tennis tournament to experiment with the format, however. Last year, ESPN+ debuted a whip-around style show for the U.S. Open.
Other whip-around shows have been praised recently as well. NBC’s Gold Zone show during the Paris Olympics last year earned rave reviews.
At the end of the day, it’s great to give fans another option when consuming a marquee event like the French Open. While some might prefer a traditional broadcast that stays locked on one match, others might prefer to see the most important points in all of the matches happening at that time.
It’s unclear what the broadcast team for TNT’s French Open whip-around show will look like, or if it will be a rotating cast of characters. Either way, it’s an exciting new way for fans to watch this year’s action.
