The Six Nations is upon us once again, with Europe's biggest rugby competition getting underway with a mouthwatering clash of France and Ireland on Friday. The BBC and ITV will be broadcasting the competition in the UK - but ITV can be a little tricky to access over here in Ireland. We've done some digging and compiled all the info you need on how to get ITV in Ireland for all of their sports coverage.
There's plenty of other sport to offer on the channel, with the Six Nations, La Liga, MotoGP, the summer's European Championships, as well as the Grand National, you'll want to know how to get ITV's channels in Ireland.
How to get ITV in Ireland on a Sky Box
There's a little bit of effort involved in accessing ITV on a Sky Box, but it is possible using the right settings. Because a Sky box uses satellite rather than cable, you can tune the box to find ITV's frequency and add it to your channels.
On a Sky Q Box, just follow the following steps to tune in ITV:
- Scroll down to the settings section on the home screen.
- Enter the 'Manual Tuning' section (you may need to enter your PIN).
- Select 'Add a channel'
- Enter the following settings:
- Frequency: 10.891
- Polarisation: H
- Symbol rate: 22.0
- FEC: 5/6
- Standard: DVB-S
- Modulation Scheme: QPSK
- After you've plugged in all of that info, you should get a list of ITV channels. You can choose one by one which you want to add to your box.
To access the channels after you've added them, just return to the 'Manual tuning' section of 'Settings' and the channels you've chosen to add to your box will be there.
How to get ITV on Saorview in Ireland
Some Saorview boxes will come with ITV pretuned with other British channels such as BBC, Channel 4 and Channel 5. If you have a satellite and a Freeview box, you should be able to access ITV.
If your box doesn't come with ITV pre-installed, you should still be able to tune in to their coverage using the same frequency settings listed above for Sky boxes.
What Six Nations games are being broadcast on ITV?
ITV will broadcast nine of the 15 games in this year's Six Nations - including every single Ireland game. The full breakdown of the Six Nations game split between BBC and ITV is below (ITV games in bold).
Round one
- France v Ireland - Friday, February 2nd, 8pm - ITV
- Italy v England - Saturday, February 3rd, 2:15pm - ITV
- Wales v Scotland - Saturday, February 3rd, 4:45pm - BBC
Round two
- Scotland v France - Saturday, February 10th, 2:15pm - BBC
- England v Wales - Saturday, February 10th, 4:45pm - ITV
- Ireland v Italy - Sunday, February 11th, 3pm - ITV
Round three
- Ireland v Wales - Saturday, February 24th, 2:15pm - ITV
- Scotland v England - Saturday, February 24th, 4:45pm - BBC
- France v Italy - Sunday, February 25th, 3pm - BBC
Round four
- Italy v Scotland - Saturday, March 9th, 2:15pm - ITV
- England v Ireland - Saturday, March 9th, 4:45pm - ITV
- Wales v France - Sunday, March 10th, 3pm - BBC
Round five
- Wales v Italy - Saturday, March 16th, 2:15pm - BBC
- Ireland v Scotland - Saturday, March 16th, 4:45pm - ITV
- France v England - Saturday, March 16th, 8pm - ITV
Who is on ITV's Six Nations punditry team?
A star-studded ITV punditry lineup for the Six Nations is headlined by Ireland legend Brian O'Driscoll and England World Cup winners Jonny Wilkinson, Lawrence Dallaglio, and Maggie Alphonsi.
Other pundits include ex-Ireland captain Rory Best, Wales' Jamie Roberts and Dan Biggar, Scots Ian McGeechan and Johnnie Beattie, Italian legend Sergio Parisse, and England's Ugo Monye. Brian O'Driscoll's former centre partner for Leinster and Ireland, Gordon D'Arcy, will be on commentary duty.
What other sports do ITV show live?
Similarly to the Six Nations, ITV share rights to the FA Cup with the BBC - and will have a selection of fixtures from the upcoming fifth round in late February.
ITV recently acquired the rights to broadcast La Liga in the UK and Ireland and broadcast ten games across the most recent season on ITV4 and ITV1.
Cheltenham and the Grand National are broadcast live on ITV each year, as is the Tour de France.
ITV will also share coverage of the 2024 European Championships with the BBC.
They also hold rights to broadcast MotoGP. ITV show highlights of each race, with occasional live races.