For the second straight year football fans won't be able to watch the English FA Cup final live on local television...but Bermuda Broadcasting Company CEO Rick Richardson has vowed next year will be different.

Last year the TV station was beaten in the bidding for the rights by local pubs who will again be showing the match -- Manchester United v Newcastle.

TV-7 will carry the game on a delay basis on Saturday evening starting at 7.00 with a pre-game show.

"When we first negotiated for the FA Cup the only option was a delay, and at first we were a little perturbed about that,'' said Richardson, a football fan himself.

The company is presently showing the Cricket World Cup live from England, which would have clashed with the FA Cup final.

"When we worked out the sports schedule we felt we would go with the delay because it would work very well with what we were doing and we wouldn't be programming against ourselves,'' Richardson explained.

"Only recently -- in the last week -- the programme owners came back to me and said `wouldn't you like to do this live' and I said `yes, but we would have wanted that a month ago at least when we had the option'. My first option was live but it wasn't open to us at that point.'' Added Richardson: "They are saying now we will have an option next year if we want live. Make no mistake about it, our first option is live, whether we have cricket on or not.'' Even in the first few days of the Cricket World Cup, Richardson says reaction has been very favourable to the live coverage.

"We've got an incredible buzz on it and a lot of people wished the West Indies had done a little better in their opening game,'' said Richardson.

"I had meetings in about four different businesses today and the only thing they were talking about was the cricket. I think people are more in tune right now to what's happening on the international cricket scene and they are following with interest.

"The fans are more knowledgeable and the talk is not like it was a few years ago. I'm not so sure if they were this abreast of international cricket 10 years ago.

"People are learning what it takes to get something like that here, we're only a small country. For the first time people have made it known `we appreciate this'.'' Live games are being carried every day until May 31 and then from June 4 when the next stage of the competition begins. The semi-finals on June 16 and 17 and the final on June 20 will also be seen live.