UP297 Sports documentary and the authenticity question

It's sometimes said that this is a golden era of sports documentary. F1's Drive to Survive has changed the landscape. Every sports rights holder wants its own version, to use as a tool to reach new audiences, whether that's the infamous Gen Z demographic or in different parts of the world, delivered by the global streamers such as Netflix and Amazon Prime.But what are trade offs required in this form of commercialised documentary. Adam Darke is a veteran documentary maker, whose work includes Winning Ugly on rugby union; Forbidden Games, the life of Justin Fashanu, Keeping Up With The Brownlees and All Or Nothing Juventus. Darke's latest series is Deadline Day: Football's Transfer Window, currently available on Sky and produced by Pitch International.  It goes behind the scenes of football's transfer marketplace, revealing the work of agents and clubs in sourcing and acquiring soccer talent at every price point. This conversation is linked to another recent podcast we recorded with Sascha Empacher, one of the stars of the documentary. You can listen to that here:UP291 Mo Salah's Agent and the meaning of transfer deadline day Unofficial Partner is the leading podcast for the business of sport. A mix of entertaining and thought provoking conversations with a who's who of the global industry. To join our community of listeners, sign up to the weekly UP Newsletter and follow us on Twitter and TikTok at @UnofficialPartnerWe publish two podcasts each week, on Tuesday and Friday. These are deep conversations with smart people from inside and outside sport. Our entire back catalogue of 500 sports business conversations are available free of charge here. Each pod is available by searching for ‘Unofficial Partner’ on Apple, Spotify and every podcast app. If you’re interested in collaborating with Unofficial Partner to create one-off podcasts or series and live events, you can reach us via the website.