Beyond Yoko Oshita: Who’s Next for Wide! Scramble Saturday?
The deep trust placed in Anchor Oshita
It was reported on February 10 by Sponichi and Sports Hochi that TV Asahi announced that “Wide! Scramble” would be scheduled as the successor to “Nakai Masahiro’s Saturday Night Show,” which is ending.
However, since there is only about a month until the new program airs, there is hardly any time to gather new staff. Therefore, some have speculated that “Yoko Ooshita (54) might also be in charge on Saturdays.”
“Wide! Scramble” started in April 1996 as an afternoon information program on the network, initially hosted by KiyokoSuizenji (79) and former NHK announcer Katsuhiro Nakamura (74). Later, male anchors such as Baku Owada (74), Daijiro Hashimoto (78), and TV Asahi’s Takashi Terasaki (62) took on the role. Ooshita became part of the show in 1998, and it was renamed “Ooshita Yoko Wide! Scramble” in April 2019.
“A female station announcer becoming the main anchor of a network’s flagship show is rare for commercial TV stations in Tokyo, and having her name in the title is proof of the trust the station has in her. However, it’s unlikely that Ooshita will also take on Saturdays,” said a veteran staff member of the wide-show.
“Ooshita starts preparing for the show from before 6 AM, even though the program doesn’t start until 10:25 AM. Given that she already handles the main show from Monday to Friday, it’s likely that she will leave Saturdays to a younger announcer. TV Asahi changed the title of ‘Sunday LIVE!!’ to match the weekday morning program ‘Good! Morning’ after the retirement of Noriyuki Higashiyama (58), which resulted in a big success with Naoyuki Hiraishi (50) taking over the weekend anchor role.
For those at the station who do not want to lose the wide-show culture, it seems like a pleasant surprise that they can rely on station announcers to handle the program while also achieving good viewership ratings. It’s highly likely that “Wide! Scramble” on Saturdays will also have a female announcer as the main MC.”
