Sports Rights: English Premier League 2007/8 2009/2010

Rizzo the Rat

"The Premier League have settled their dispute with the European Commission over television rights.

The EC say the deal over rights for the 2007/08 season will give fans "greater choice and better value''.

The League have given a commitment that at least two broadcasters will share the rights in the future and no bidder will be allowed to buy more than five of the six packages of live games"

The main reason I and many others got Sky is for their football coverage and in particular the Premiership in England. I must say they do it very well.
I am not as worried about this as i was a few weeks ago since ITV joined Sky. We also have BBC on Sky so only problem now is Setanta will probably get one of the packages.
Any chance Sky will reduce prices for Sky Sports subscription if they can only show a fraction of the live matches?? 2 chances i suppose!!

Mossy Monk

Rizzo the Rat wrote:

The EC say the deal over rights for the 2007/08 season will give fans "greater choice and better value''.

bollocks imo especially if Setanta gets the rights then we would be forced to subscribe to them aswell to see what we are seeing now

MisterAnarchy

Might be a good thing.
Most of people's sports subscription to Sky is absorbed to pay for the rights to the English Prmier League.
I wonder what % of the sports sub is wasted showing such exciting Super Sundays as Birmingham V West Brom .
I much prefer to watch the Spanish league .
With the new competition and RTE showing matches on a Saturday hopefully there will be more attractive deals out there.
ITv and BBC are now free on satellite and the freeview lineup is strenghtening in the UK each week.
I see major rethinking for Sky.

eigrod

It is difficult to predict what is going to happen here.

If Setanta were to get a piece of the cake, its going to cost them and its hard to see them being able to continue as a part of the NTL standard package in that situation.

I am confused as to what they mean by "six packages of live games".

Sponge Bob

eigrod wrote:

I am confused as to what they mean by "six packages of live games".

c.60 live games = 6 packages of 10 shown in a season.

One operator may get 5/6 or 50 but another operator will get the remaining package of 10 geames...even if outbid.

I assume that the last package will not be Wigan vs Sunderland and Southampton vs Portsmouth type games but must have a few scouse and mancie and london derbies included .

DMC

At present, 138 games are shown, between Sky Sports (88) and Prem Plus (50).
Thats after the Premier League had divided those in gold, silver, bronze and PPV packages.

At that rate, 23 matches would be available to other, equivalent to almost one a week.

Jungle Boy

I doubt we will notice any difference to the amount of EPL on Sky Sports 1
Currently
Sky Sports 1 : 88 matches
PremPlus : 50 matches
Expected
Sky Sports 1 : (4 packages x 23 matches) 92 matches
PremPlus : (1 package) 23 matches
Setanta : (1 package) 23 matches

The only difference is we will be paying Setanta instead of Sky for some PPV matches.

Mossy Monk

yes but Setanta want a full years subscription upfront which i think is disgraceful

so that versus the €70 for prem+?

no contest really if it will be half the games

dmeehan

how much is a setanta sub at present?

DMC

€13 per month or €150 per year, €7 registration fee, on Sky.

watty

I reckon I save a fortune in money, agonising and time by being A) Not much interested in watching Sport on TV, B)Less interested in Football. C) Is Football at the "Premiier" level actually sport or some kind of Gladitorial Entertainment?

But it is a relatively free country and I don't see why anyone should be either deprived of Football or have to subscribe to Sky. Before Sky, ALL the Football was FTA.

Mossy Monk

all what football was FTA. there was nowhere near as much football on terrestrial tv and who is to say football will end up on a FTA channel anyway

noby

Between RTE, TV3 and ITV (available 'free' and FTA) there's a live prem match every 2-3 saturdays, aswell as a hell of a lot of champions league/uefa cup ties, and a few LOI matches (including on TG4). That's surely enough to keep the *average* footie fan happy without any sky/setanta sub.
That's without going searching for other FTA matches.There is more to football than the premiership, you know

Strasser

Mossy Monk wrote:

bollocks imo especially if Setanta gets the rights then we would be forced to subscribe to them aswell to see what we are seeing now

I agree, this EU sticking their noses in will mean less choice for viewers not more unless we fork out even more money. Prem football = 1 product and one provider should be allowed show it.

JohnC.

Do some people really think (or just hope?) that out of all the stuff that Sky Sports shows, the lack of 10 or 12 football games in a year is going to reduce subscription costs? If Sky Sports only showed Premier League football, then there would be a case. But 12 football games must only be a very small part of their annual output.

Mossy Monk

noby wrote:

Between RTE, TV3 and ITV (available 'free' and FTA) there's a live prem match every 2-3 saturdays, aswell as a hell of a lot of champions league/uefa cup ties, and a few LOI matches (including on TG4). That's surely enough to keep the *average* footie fan happy without any sky/setanta sub.
That's without going searching for other FTA matches.There is more to football than the premiership, you know

why dont you re read my post

the words "WHAT" and "WAS" would denote past tense. now tell me all the football that was FTA before Sky seeing as you know so much about it

watty

Strasser wrote:

I agree, this EU sticking their noses in will mean less choice for viewers not more unless we fork out even more money. Prem football = 1 product and one provider should be allowed show it.

It isn't really about choice for viewers as such, it is to prohibit monopoly and one trader having an unfair advantage. Seems to me though that allowing one bidder to have 5 out of 6 packs is not much of a limitation to the dominant bidder. I guess it was a compromise.

The whole issue was looked at by EU because of British Complaints, it was not an EU inititive and in fact a similar scenario was found to exist in France with Football, but no-one minded (much). In UK there was issue of terrestrial TV not getting any.

Posters here seem to have the French viewpoint rather than the British.

But don't blame Brussels on this one.

watty

all what football was FTA. there was nowhere near as much football on terrestrial tv and who is to say football will end up on a FTA channel anyway

I think I have never claimed to be an expert on Football as sport, or on the heavily franchised entertainment sold as football today.

Since I never watched Football I have no idea (how much there was), but there was at least one full match every Saturday.

There was none on Satellite / Cable / MMDS because in N.I. we just had BBC1, then ITV in 1955, then in about 1967 or 1969 BBC2. I forget when C4 happened. Some curious folk got the RTE1 from Longford when it started in about 1977?

Of course there was no RTE1 till 1962 (a bit tardy really, 11 Years after the USA got Color TV!). When did RTE2 start? It seemed somewhat in Embryo when I moved to Limerick in 1983. Actually mostly we watched RTE Nature & Irish music, VHS tapes and some old 1/2" reel to reel B&W video recordings as the two channels did not have much on them really.

No cable anywhere in NI then (1950s to 1980s). No Satellite TV in UK at all.

So from the 1950s till when Sky Sport started (about 40 years?) whatever Football was on TV was Free for viewers.

Certinally plenty of folk I knew expressed opinion that there was too much sport on TV and that the continual "stealling" of R4 LW for sport was a pain. Then R5 was created to be dedicated Sport Radio (late 1970s?).

The Beeb could never create a dedicated sport TV channel as the TV bandwidth did not exist. Ch Five was supossed to be Digital only, but the DTT was still years away. There was quite a row about mess Five made of UK Terrestrial analog band plan which like here is only designed for 4 channels. That is why it was FTA effectively on Sky Analog.


I do remember watching TV prior to 1960, but I watched Wooden Tops and various entertainments, I would have turned TV on and let it warm up on the Test Card with curatins pulled as the screen was dim (1958). We got a newer set in just before my sister was born so that must have been 1959 or 1960. It could be watched in daylight. My dad would have watched rugby, but I don't have any memory of him doing that before 1970 or so, I may not have noticed or forgotten.

I think it likely the new plan will help no-one and annoy more than it pleases. People in UK are fairly upset about what will be the situation for Cricket being Pay for Tests next summer for 1st Time.

Unlike Football many enthusists who watch in past will not subscribe to Sky sports.

If Football fans were not prepared to pay, then Sky Sports would not be the premium package. Sky is pitching price at "what the market wil bear". Same with these overpriced inferior quality frequently changed club strips.

DMC

I'll fill in some gaps for you, watty...

For the history of football on British TV, there are some good articles here...

http://www.transdiffusion.org/emc/worldofsport/premier.php

http://www.transdiffusion.org/emc/worldofsport/blackout.php

http://www.transdiffusion.org/emc/worldofsport/premiership.php

A quick potted history..

• Only live football matches through to the early 1980's were the FA Cup final and some European games.
• Late 1970's, "Match of the Day" and "The Big Match" often swapped Saturday nights and Sunday afternoons into the 1980's. Highlights were often only of one or two matches over an hour of TV. Not even a camera at the other games in the top flight.
• In early 1980's, the BBC and ITV shared some live rights, but no more than 10 games or so.
• In 1987, ITV tabled a knockout bid for the Football League Division 1. BBC loose all rights, bar FA Cup. Live football every week (normally Sunday afternoons)
• 1992, Premier League formed after breakaway from Football League. Negioated £325 million live deal with BSkyB, BBC get highlights.
• Only blip since then has been ITV taking the highlights away from 2001-2004, which subsiquent went back.

For the radio points, Radio 2 was the spiritual home of BBC Radio Sport for donkeys. In 1978, it was decided that Radio 2 would leave LW for Radio 4, and with that, 693 and 909 MW were the home of sports coverage, and the rest of the normal Radio 2 schedule was on FM/VHF. Radio 2 finally shook off sport in 1989, when the old Radio 5 was setup, still using 909/693, which, in turn, changed to Radio 5 Live in March 1994.

UTV started 31st October 1959, RTÉ 2 started 1st November 1978, Channel 4 started 2nd November 1982.

Cricket going completely to Sky is a real pain for me. I do and will subscribe to Sky Sports, but, imho, its a crock.

mjsmyth

For what its worth........
What if, now this is a big what if, BBC and ITV in this new freesat venture they are launching, joined together to purchase some of the rights? Bid for one, maybe try for two.

Then they have 46 games a years (is my maths right) that they can show live. I dunno how they would work out the logistics, but on altenative days either one of the channels would have a live match.

To me it makes simple sense It would be a big publicity coup for their new FTA offering, even if they only jointly bid for one package together, it would still be 23 live matches a year, more than we currently have for free.

Anyway, sorryy, I was just dreaming.
MJ

Mossy Monk

it would certainly be a nice situation. dont forget BBC and ITV already share the rights to the World Cup and European Championships

Drag00n79

From what I have read so far the contenders for the new rights deal seem to be ITV and NTL together, Setanta, Bravo, Five. If the Five got it, the whole UK FTV cards issue would increase again big time. No word from the Beeb yet but I'm sure they will at least put in a bid.

byte

Interestign to see Bravo mentioned as a contender. I guess they're into football now that they have Football Italia, etc. They may hope to be stronger competition with ITV4.

Though I doubt if they will win it. I don't think they'd even have the funding for it, same with five, though I suppose you never know. It would more than likely be either Setanta, or an ITV joint venture (NTL/BBC/whoever).

Mossy Monk

byte wrote:

I don't think they'd even have the funding for it, same with five, though I suppose you never know

who knows. RTL are a huge group

byte

Mossy Monk wrote:

who knows. RTL are a huge group

Yeah, true. We'll just have to wait and see how she blows.

channelsurfer

why do you all think setanta will win the last package. the way it will work is that all 6 packages will have different bids so potentially there will be 6 different winners. ( I know stupid really aint likely to happen) but My guess is that it could end up potentially with sky winning 4 of the packages and been outbid on 2 others by either itv/ntl setanta. bt etc. as noone will know how much each other is bidding. obvioulsy the one package which will go for the highest amount is the sunday 4pm one so that will probably go to sky unless ntl decides they really need football on their pay tv channel at 4pm on a sunday if it launches.

DMC

Sky will whammy any bid on the first 5. Easily.

JohnC.

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/article/ds32166.html
Sky got 3 of the 3 up for bidding in the first round. The final 3 will be done soon in the second round. Sky is, of course, expected to get 2 of those.

DMC

I don't see reported what actual packages Sky have won, but I would safely say they are the Super Sunday fixtures, they are the fixtures they most prize. They would also bid for a Saturday package, to show top of the table clashes they cant show on Sunday because of European games.

No great earthquakes yet.

Just so people know, these are the packages... each one has 23 games.

Package A: 23 matches shown at 4pm on Sunday.

Package B: 23 matches shown at 1.30pm on Sunday.

Package C: a minimum of 12 matches at 8pm on Monday, the rest either at 1.30pm on Sunday or 5.15pm on Saturday or other times.

Package a minimum of 18 matches at 5.15pm on Saturday, the rest either at 1.30pm on Sunday, 8pm on Monday or other times.

Package E: 23 matches shown at 12.45pm on Saturday.

Package F: seven to 13 matches on midweek evenings/bank holidays, 10 to 16 at 12.45pm on Saturday and 4pm on Sunday.

I reckon Package D or E would be 6th on the list for Sky, as Package F will give them the flexability of big matches at Saturday lunchtime.

Package E would suit someone like Setanta for PPV. 23 games out of 138 isn't a huge dent to Sky.

Jungle Boy

The Times (another News Corp company) are reporting that BSkyB have won B, E, F

Package A:
23 matches shown at 4pm on Sunday.

Package B:
23 matches shown at 1.30pm on Sunday.

Package C:
a minimum of 12 matches at 8pm on Monday, the rest either at 1.30pm on Sunday or 5.15pm on Saturday or other times.

Package
a minimum of 18 matches at 5.15pm on Saturday, the rest either at 1.30pm on Sunday, 8pm on Monday or other times.

Package E:
23 matches shown at 12.45pm on Saturday.

Package F:
seven to 13 matches on midweek evenings/bank holidays, 10 to 16 at 12.45pm on Saturday and 4pm on Sunday.

This is not going to plan. BSkyB might have a nervous week as they wait to learn whether they have won Package A. It looks like the other broadcasters have made competitive bids. I believe that Setanta wanted Packages D & E so they could launch Setanta Soccer Saturday (12.15pm, 3pm, 5.15pm).

Sky failed to win the flagship Sunday 4pm package, which gives the owner the pick of the weekend’s fixtures 23 times a season. Bids for that package could exceed £250 million — representing £3.6 million a game for the three-year life of the deal.

watty

This idea of splitting seems to me to benefit PROVIDERS as a group (they all get a piece of cake). Baffles me how it any use to viewers.

Limit Footballer saleries to 700 Euro a week world wide and make all the matches must carry on every platform at 15,000 a match per broadcaster.

People played football before TV invented. The money and footballer saleries have gone mad.

DMC

News conference at 4:45pm today....

DMC

From Media Guardian... "Irish broadcaster Setanta is understood to have won at least one of three Premier League TV rights packages still up for grabs. "

DMC

Sky have package B, E and F.... (last week) and package A ONLY 4

C & D to Setanta

DMC

All matches of Sky's 4 packages will be on Sky Sports, no pay-per-view matches by Sky themselves, which is 4 more matches.

£1.706 billion in total, up from £1.6 billion.

These are UK only rights, it is also possible, that Sky might not have these matches to show in Ireland.

zAbbo

DMC wrote:

All matches of Sky's 4 packages will be on Sky Sports, no pay-per-view matches by Sky themselves, which is 4 more matches.

£1.76 billion in total, up from £1.6 billion.

These are UK only rights, it is also possible, that Sky might not have these matches to show in Ireland.

What happens to Prem Plus then ?

channelsurfer

prem plus is now gone. He did that setanta would also show them on their normal channels. and yes he did say that irish rights are seperate so that could mean that setanta could get the sunday matches for ireland. Cant see sky letting them go without a fight.

DMC

Prem Plus is R.I.P from season 07/08... well.. Sky's version of the channel anyway.

And R.I.P for Sky Sports' "Monday Night Football" too.

Setanta might go PPV.... we will have to wait and see what they will offer. We should know more shortly.

DMC

Just to split the figures...

Sky £1.314bn for 92 games per year,
Setanta £392m for 46 games per year.

eigrod

DMC wrote:

Just to split the figures...

Sky £1.314bn for 92 games per year,
Setanta £392m for 46 games per year.

So Setanta are getting half as many games for a quarter of the price. That's boggling and I can't see SKY being too happy about that.

This is a disaster for the consumer and the EU should take a long hard look at themselves & their rules.

DMC

But, Sky still have the ones they prize, which is Package A (4pm on Sunday) which is top picks, and other packages that will allow scheduling flexability.

The only one really crowing are the league chairmen...

DMC

Statement from Setanta Sports... no big details yet.

Setanta Sport Holdings Ltd ("Setanta Sports"), the leading international sports broadcaster, is pleased to announce that it has been awarded Package C and Package D today by the FA Premier League.

These packages represent a total of 46 games. Package C consists of a minimum of 12 matches at 8pm Mondays, the rest either will be broadcast at 1.30pm on Sunday or 5.15pm on Saturday. Package D consists of a minimum of 18 matches at 5.15pm on Saturdays and the rest either at 1.30pm on Sunday or 8pm on Monday. The rights run for three seasons, commencing August 2007.

Setanta Sports is the second largest pay sports broadcaster in the UK. The company holds the rights to leading international sporting properties in different markets including the premier leagues in Scotland, France, Germany, Italy, Holland and broadcasts to over 100 million digital homes throughout the world.

The two joint chief executives are Michael O'Rourke and Leonard Ryan who founded the company in 1990. Last year, Benchmark Capital Europe, the top-tier venture capital firm, made a substantial investment in the company and now owns a 40% stake.

Setanta Sports will be broadcasting the Premier League matches within their 7-channel Sports Pack* on both satellite and cable platforms, ensuring the widest possible distribution to viewers.

Setanta Sport's director of sport, Trevor East, said, "This is an important day in the development of Setanta Sports and another milestone for us. Following on from last week's announcement of greater coverage of the Scottish Premier League, we are delighted to be able to add the FA Premier League to our channel offering. We are committed to providing a first-class sports service to our customers and the FAPL is a jewel in any broadcaster's crown. It will ensure that Setanta Sports is a must-have sports channel for all football fans."

DMC

And BSkyB's press release....

Press Release

Premier League Announcement

British Sky Broadcasting Group PLC
05 May 2006


Press Release 5 May 2006

BSKYB WINS FA PREMIER LEAGUE PACKAGE "A" FOR A TOTAL OF FOUR PACKAGES

Following an announcement by the FA Premier League today, BSkyB confirmed that
it had been awarded a fourth package of live rights, package A. In addition to
the three packages of 23 games each awarded to Sky last week, this package gives
Sky rights to a further 23 matches airing Sundays at 16:00.

"This is good news for fans, football and Sky," said Vic Wakeling, Managing
Director, Sky Sports. "Sky is the home of football. We will offer first picks,
the best matches and biggest head-to-heads. There will be more live Premiership
matches on Sky Sports than ever: 92 games per season, up from 88 games today."

With these rights, Sky has won the opportunity to offer live football in new and
exciting ways. "Viewers can look forward to years of innovative coverage of live
Premiership football, all broadcast in HD. Fans will also have new ways of
watching using broadband and mobile," continued Mr Wakeling.

Jeremy Darroch, Chief Financial Officer at Sky, added, "We are very pleased with
this result. We have won the best packages at prices that are right for Sky.
This gives us certainty for the future and secures Premiership football until
the end of the decade. It underlines Sky's strength as we drive towards all our
targets."

For the three-year period starting in season 2007/8, Sky will pay a total of
£1,314 million for the four packages it has been awarded.

End

Notes to Editors

Live Premiership matches on Sky Sports:

1992/3-96/97     60 per season
1997/8-2000/1    66 per season
2001/2-2003/4    66 per season
2004/5-2006/7    88 per season
2007/8-2009/10   92 per season

channelsurfer

digitalspy says that the setant rights will not be available in ireland. looks like a seperate auction will take place for all 6 packages and the 3 pm saturday one. wonder will rte show interest?

cupthehand

Has the bell tolled for Prem Plus?, seems like it as Setanta have taken up their allocation of matches.
And also will we see an increase in the price of subscription of Setanta now they've forked out all the cash for the Premiership.

flogen

Good to see some reasonable split (4:2 rather than 5:1), although there are now issues of cost etc.

The thing about the Irish rights is interesting too; I'd say they'll go for a lot cheaper but Setanta will get the majority of them... TV3 are said to be looking for more sport too so you never know (although they're probably unwilling to spend any money considering their situation atm)

eirebhoy

I think you're getting a lot more value for your money with Setanta over Prem plus. Setanta costs €150 a year, Prem+ costs €70 a year. With Prem+ you get 50 (usually poor) matches a year. With Setanta you get 6 channels (Setanta Ireland, Setanta Sports 1, Setanta Sports 2, Celtic TV, Rangers TV, NASN) showing:

46 - 76 premiership matches a year (If they win the Irish rights they get an extra 30?)
60 SPL games a year (38 Celtic/Rangers on Sundays, 22 non-old firm on Friday/Saturday night).
French Football
German Football
Dutch Football
Italian Football
Celtic League and French Top 14 rugby
GAA
Formula 1
UEFA cup/International qualifiers/other
Some golf
A load of American Sports
and anything else they decide to put on.

Sky will be showing more football than ever before so I don't think people can complain about that.

channelsurfer

actually setanta nor sky have won the irish rights yet. so as of now those matches will not be on setanta ireland. they have to bid seperately for the irish rights to all six packages. Scudamore said that yesterday and setanta say they will not be available in ireland.

eirebhoy

channelsurfer wrote:

actually setanta nor sky have won the irish rights yet. so as of now those matches will not be on setanta ireland. they have to bid seperately for the irish rights to all six packages. Scudamore said that yesterday and setanta say they will not be available in ireland.

I don't understand that at all. We have the same channels in Ireland as they do in the UK. How do they stop us watching them? I thought the Irish rights were just for the Saturday 3pm games.

flogen

So does this mean that if Sky get some matches in Ireland that they don't have in the UK they'll have to have dedicated Irish broadcasts? Interesting.

channelsurfer

eirebhoy wrote:

I don't understand that at all. We have the same channels in Ireland as they do in the UK. How do they stop us watching them? I thought the Irish rights were just for the Saturday 3pm games.

You will probably get the famous )08 screen This progam is not available to viewers in the republic of ireland.