Seven’s experienced team at the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games is brimming over with people who have been with the broadcaster for much of their working lives. It’s a team that’s well versed in big events having covered a Summer and Winter Olympics within the past 12 months. Now they are together again for Birmingham 2022.
Overseeing the Seven presence in Birmingham is Seven’s planning manager for Birmingham 2022 Dacien Hadland. He’s a special event veteran who’s never worked anywhere else.
“I started in the Seven newsroom at Epping in 2000 as the Sky News liaison,” Hadland told Mediaweek. [Back when Seven part-owned Sky News Australia and supplied much of the news footage.] “I worked my way up, taught myself how to edit and then worked on the first incarnation of Sunrise with Mel Doyle and Chris Reason in 2001.”
Above: Dacien Hadland (left) with Seven’s Hugh Whitfeld. Top: Hadland in Beijing 2022 gear and Birmingham’s main stadium
Hadland spent several years with Sunrise and the news overseeing some of the special projects and then moved into bigger events like the Olympic and Commonwealth Games.
A trip with the Seven Sunrise weather team, then led to Grant Denyer, to Beijing to preview the Beijing Games in 2008 was Hadland’s first international event.
Hadland works under Seven’s Andy Kay [general manager of Olympics and Commonwealth Games – 38 years with Seven] who oversees everything from major sporting events to the Seven Upfronts. Hadland has worked on Upfronts for the last seven years, but he clammed up when we asked if there was anything he could share about the forthcoming 2023 event? Might Seven be doing many filming in Birmingham for the Upfronts? “I am not at liberty to say,” he replied with a grin.
Kay will be based in Sydney during the Games and talks often to the team in the UK. Although Hadland will silence his phone for messages during the night, if Andy Kay calls Hadland will answer.
Is Birmingham 2022 like Tokyo 2020?
“Yes and no,” said Hadland. “It all comes down to rights. They were signed quite late so some of the planning was later than it normally might have been. Television has changed and our equipment requirements are a lot smaller. By the time we get to Brisbane, 2032, and whoever has the rights, a lot of the equipment and storage will be in the cloud. At the last Beijing Olympics they were doing the host broadcast transmission of all the feeds in the cloud.”
Hadland hosted Mediaweek on our Birmingham visit to the Seven IBC bunker. It’s a compact space, loaded with tech, wedged between the operations of host broadcaster Sunset+Vine, and the larger home of BBC Sport.
The set-up in Birmingham sees Seven with a team a 40 reporters, commentators, techs and producers who have travelled from Australia who have been joined by the existing British reporting team. They also have local drivers transporting people between venues and even some runners provided by the host broadcaster as part of a training program.
Control room inside Seven’s IBC bunker
Seven’s outlay on Olympic and Commonwealth Games is significant, even before adding the costs of production. Who manages the day-to-day budgeting to make sure they don’t run over?
Hadland said he works on that alongside Jane McGill (production manager) and Dave Watts (project engineer) who work closely with Seven’s Commonwealth Games executive producer Kirsty Bradmore. “We all have to be nimble when it comes to budgets as sometimes they are set a long way out, particularly in the case of Olympics. We make estimates and sometimes things are under, yet other items may be over so there is some moving of money around.”
Seven major event veteran Dave Watts
Highlights for Seven’s event coverage of Birmingham 2022 include having Bruce McAvaney on location in the main stadium during the athletic coverage and also a daily late night show Brum Drum hosted by Mel McLaughlin and Jason Richardson. “That show goes out late night in Australia and will recap recent results and also feature some live action,” said Hadland. “It will be a lot of fun and feature special guests and will be broadcast from our Victoria Square position in central Manchester. That’s right beside a live site so there will be people about and an audience watching.”
Commonwealth cabling keeping Australia connected
Birmingham 2022 Medals predictions
Seven has talked about 200 Aussie medal chances in Birmingham, but Hadland didn’t want to predict how many gold medals Australia might take home. “There has been a lot of planning around this and we have something called the Medal Hunt which identifies where all the gold medals will be awarded. Australia might come home with a couple of hundred medals and it will be interesting just how many of them will be gold.”
The prior Commonwealth Games were held on the Gold Coast where Australia won more medals than anyone else – 193 medals, 78 gold.
“The Australian team is very strong. The competition in Birmingham is different because we don’t have the Olympic stage with major countries like China and the US. We will do very well in swimming and athletics.”
See also:
Commonwealth Games 2022: Meet the hosts and commentators
Seven’s Hugh Whitfeld in relative calm of Birmingham as he tracks Aussie Gold