Comparative Study of Local and International Sports in Sporting Life Newspaper in Nigeria

Sports provide valuable media content, and many sports depend on the media for publicity and revenues. The media and sports are mutually dependent, and media now have a symbiotic relationship in which sports is a staple of media content and the media are essential to the finances and promotion of sports. As the media promote sports, sports, on the other hand, generate income for the media. Also, sports and the media have become associated to such an extent that it is often difficult to discuss sports in modern society without acknowledging its relationship with the media. Thus, the study used the variables of frequency, prominence, and direction to measure the extent to which Sporting Life newspaper covers and reports local and international sports. To locate the study within the context of the theoretical framework, Gatekeeping and Agenda-Setting theories were used to serve the study goal. The study adopts quantitative content analysis as a research method and a coding sheet as a method of data collection. The study employs a composite sampling technique to arrive at the sample size, which was drawn from the sampled newspaper from January to July 2021. The study concluded that Sporting Life newspaper must intensify efforts to report more news stories on a neutral level at all times. This is so because the media remain the channel through which sports activities can reach the domain of the public.

Keywords:Agenda setting; Gatekeeping; Local sports; Press; Sporting Life