Yes, Ryan Fitzgerald has replaced Sam Pang for tonight’s Winter Olympics special.
There was a special appearance by the cash cow at the beginning of the ep.
Edit: The show ran for exactly an hour as scheduled, finishing at 10pm aedt. Which means that the normal version can do the same during the AFL Season, instead of running overtime by 30+ minutes week in week out 
Who was the female reported they crossed to in Beijing? She was hilarious!
Lydia lassila. First winter games post retirement
The banter with her was great.
Yep, gotta agree with that. The banter there was great especially the dig at Andy - the voice of curling or whatever it was.
“The Front Bar: All Sports” - is this just a once off show, or will it last for a few weeks, until the AFL regular version starts in mid March?
Just now on the Winter Olympics, Mick Molly said, “I’m so glad we’re doing these all sports shows” (plural).
There will be 3 episodes.
Premieres Wednesday 23 February at 8.45pm
Mick, Sam and Andy return for The Front Bar: All Sports on Seven
The Front Bar is back! Mick Molloy, Andy Maher and Sam Pang will assume their usual positions at the bar on Channel 7 and 7plus from Wednesday 23 February, kicking off a special three-week series where they dive deeper into the world of sports.
No sport will be off limits when the boys give their take on the week that was, re-live Australia’s most memorable sports moments and celebrate at the bar with some of Australia’s most iconic athletes.
Molloy said The Front Bar team was raring to go for the All Sports editions, despite a knock-back on his own ideas for a new show.
“I’ve been working on a spin-off of The Front Bar called The Back Bar. It’s basically Andy Maher playing the pokies,” Molloy said.
“While that would’ve been quality viewing, expanding to all sports for a few weeks has been nice, because after two years of lockdown, it’s been great to sit on the couch and watch different sports all day. I’ve missed that.”
Next week’s show is set to be a classic, with former Australian Grand Prix motorcycle road racing World Champion Mick Doohan stopping by, while one of Australia’s greatest-ever basketball legends gets his Last Dance moment. Ryan “Fitzy”’ Fitzgerald will also be on hand
to catch up with a world-class Aussie tennis star at the top of her game.The Front Bar: All Sports will welcome 7NEWS’ Mel McLaughlin as a co-host during the second and third editions, fresh off the back of her time in Beijing for the 2022 Winter Olympics.
Sheesh. What a dreadful decision.
I think it’s more a test… if it rates better in northern markets, expect the format to stay throughout the year.
Mel is very bad at live banter so not sure why she’s been chosen.
Chris Gayle would agree with this.
Would they really want to sacrifice the strong Melbourne ratings they get by moving away from an AFL-focused show? You can’t have it both ways.
It will highly be likely return to the normal AFL version when it starts after this 3 week “all-sports show”. Probably just trying to build momentum for us in the northern states.
As for Mel McLaughlinS being co-host, well, good luck. She does seem to stumble and hard to banter quite regularly when crossing back to Mark Ferguson (or whoever is presenting the Sydney News) or whoever is presenting the Winter Olympics. As a reporter though, se is fine.
Indeed. The humour is very focused on Vic, SA and WA markets. I’d also wager Mel would be quite off putting to Victorian audiences.
And if they wanted a woman, there’s plenty of good Victorian based comedians that are into AFL. Eg Geraldine Hickey.
I know it’s politically incorrect to say this, but adding a woman will ruin the show’s dynamic.
The show’s whole charm is three average men sitting at the bar talking about footy and ribbing each other.
Not every show on television needs to feature a woman just to meet a gender equality quota.
