ITV revamps Saturday nights for the autumn.(Independent Television)(Brief Article)

ITV's new autumn schedule has received a mixed response from the media industry at a time when it desperately needs to build up flagging advertising revenues.

The new chief executive, Stuart Prebble, announced plans to add the ITV brand to all of its services, rebranding the ITV Network as ITV1 later this year and rebranding ONdigital as ITV Digital on 11 July.

The director of ITV Channels, David Liddiment, presented ITV's new ideas for capturing targeted audiences.

Most trumpeted was a new Saturday night line-up of early evening football and films in an effort to tempt a young male audience to stay in. Spin-off programmes will run in the week to make the most of ITV's rights to Premier League football.

However, the media industry was disappointed not to have a time for the new football programme or an exact line-up, given it is to launch in just six weeks' time.

But the move to shore up ITV's sport coverage, including the launch of the ITV Sport Channel on 11 August, has been widely welcomed by media buyers.

Andy Zonfrillo, the broadcast buying director at MindShare, is positive about the proposed sport and new dramas. He said: "ITV1 is clearly building up its sports credentials and I disagree with criticisms that there will be too much football -- ITV Sport Channel is a paid-for channel so people can just switch off."