Liverpool to host BBC Sports Personality of the Year 2017
The beeb’s Sports Personality of the Year is to be held in Liverpool for 2017.
“We’re honoured and excited to be rolling out the red carpet for BBC Sports Personality of the Year in Liverpool. We’re a city full of passionate sports fans and we’re renowned the world over for our hospitality, so we cannot wait to welcome the BBC in December.” – Joe Anderson, Mayor of Liverpool
BBC Sport has announced that the North West city will host the biggest awards night in the sporting calendar, BBC Sports Personality Of The Year 2017. Presenters Gary Lineker, Clare Balding and Gabby Logan will be back to host and celebrate the best sporting achievements from the past twelve months in front of an audience of nearly 11,000, while broadcasting live to millions on BBC One from Echo Arena Liverpool on Sunday 17th December.
Liverpool, which last hosted the awards in 2008, is home to two of the most famous football teams in the world, Everton and Liverpool, while Royal Birkdale this week stages golf’s Open Championship, one of the leading events on the global sporting calendar and nearby is of course the world famous Aintree Racecourse.
The area is also not shy of stars itself, having proudly produced the likes of football icons Steven Gerrard and Wayne Rooney, heptathlete Katarina Johnson-Thompson and world champion boxer Tony Bellew. Liverpool is sure to give the great and good of sport an incredible welcome. Last year, Wimbledon men’s singles champion Andy Murray picked up the coveted BBC Sports Personality of the Year Award for a record third time in front of a 12,000-strong audience at Birmingham’s Genting Arena.
The city has been the backdrop to many programmes over the years, including cul-de-sac soap opera Brookside airing on Channel 4 from 1982 through to 2003 and in the 1980s and 1990s Granada Television had a production base at the Albert Docks, which notably gave ITV viewers magazine show This Morning from 1988 to 1996.
“2017 marks a very exciting year of sport. From England winning the Six Nations to Chelsea winning the Premier League, Arsenal scooping the FA Cup at Wembley Stadium to Anthony Joshua’s nail-biting knock out fight against Wladimir Klitschko. With plenty more highlights still to come we’re going to be spoiled for choice and the nominee list will once again be genuinely difficult to pull together.” – Director of BBC Sport Barbara Slater
