Sports Extra (TNT/Premier)

radiowaves wrote: »

Unfortunately sporting rights are not sold on the basis of what you expect

Sky agreed to take Irish rights in co-existence with the providers here. BT are a different animal (they mightn't have launched here but for agreement with Setanta) and they might not want to buy the Irish rights. It's obvious their priority isn't Irish subscribers for reasons I've already indicated.

And if they don't buy the Irish rights, as I said, you will have no choice but to accept geo-blocking - and it would happen precisely because the CL is high-profile!

Around 10% of sky's subscribers are Irish, that is a lot of potential subscribers for BT sport to ignore.

indiewindy wrote: »

Around 10% of sky's subscribers are Irish, that is a lot of potential subscribers for BT sport to ignore.

BT Sport are a separate company to Sky.

They also view the subscription TV model differently (their channels free to their broadband subscribers - Sky do it the other way round).

I keep pointing it out, to this point the main (perhaps only) point of BT Sport was to drive subscribers to BT's core business of telephony. They have no potential to do that here so it's hard to see how they might view any potential Irish subscribers.

However, the fact that they are in bed with Setanta might drive them to take the Irish rights.

The fact that they now have exclusive CL rights for the UK in addition to PL football might lead them to view their TV business differently too.

None of us knows, but the fact of the matter is that Irish rights are sold separately and differently to the UK ones and just because a channel is available here doesn't automatically mean their sporting rights for the UK will be.

Like it or not we will have to accept geo-blocking in Ireland if BT don't take the Irish rights whatever some people might "expect" to happen.

EDIT: Irishfeen got there before me and clarified it better than I attempted to!

radiowaves wrote: »

BT Sport are a separate company to Sky.

They also view the subscription TV model differently (their channels free to their broadband subscribers - Sky do it the other way round

I have sky and the broadband was free for the first 2 months.

I presume they will show champions league matches on Bt Sport 1/2 and ESPN.

Did they get 100% exclusive rights to the Europa League aswell?

This today was a huge announcement and the 1st time that Sky as far as I am aware have been beaten in a major football rights auction. It is also bad news for the consumer as it is going to lead to increased subscriptions in the long term especially if you want to have every match in both the Champion's League and the Premier League available to you. The size of the bid today also makes absolutely no sense to me unless BT are also budgeting to prepare a bid for the next tranche of Premier League matches to become the majority broadcaster in the next contract.

Some of the points raised today in this thread are very similar to when BT Sport acquired the UK rights for the three years of PL rights that started this season. There was no mention of Ireland in the press release on that day just exactly as there was no mention of Ireland in the UEFA press announcement today just as there was not a mention of Ireland in each of the last CL press releases when Sky acquired the UK rights.

I fully expect that BT Sport will have full rights to Ireland. It would also be my expectation that by the time this new contract kicks in that there will be new developments for subscribers to BT Sport both here and in the UK to allow full access to all games via a red button or similar service.

As to Ireland and a limited choice of viewing for non-BT subscribers it is quite possible that these matches could be on Setanta available FTV rather than any of the existing terrestrial stations. It will be probably next April before we know this.

Just because the present Europa League coverage is blocked on BT Sport/ESPN does not necessarily mean that this will also be the case for the next contract, after all the UK announcement today was very different from the announcement of three years ago when the Champions League contract was awarded in April 2011 and the Europa League contract in October 2011.

In conclusion I am saying that it is a mistake to assume that just because Ireland is not mentioned in any of the press releases today means that Ireland's TV deal for coverage has not already been decided. I know if I was the CEO of BT bidding this massive amount of increased revenue to UEFA today I would want some extra bundles of right's thrown it.

This is nothing to do with UEFA but a lot of people here also assumed that there would be no PL 3pm KO games available on Irish TV this season which also proved not to be the case as a result of the Murphy case involving the Portsmouth publican.

I should also add that my opinions are entirely my own and I have very often been wrong in the past and could be this time as well.

redabbey wrote: »

This today was a huge announcement and the 1st time that Sky as far as I am aware have been beaten in a major football rights auction. It is also bad news for the consumer as it is going to lead to increased subscriptions in the long term especially if you want to have every match in both the Champion's League and the Premier League available to you. The size of the bid today also makes absolutely no sense to me unless BT are also budgeting to prepare a bid for the next tranche of Premier League matches to become the majority broadcaster in the next contract.

Some of the points raised today in this thread are very similar to when BT Sport acquired the UK rights for the three years of PL rights that started this season. There was no mention of Ireland in the press release on that day just exactly as there was no mention of Ireland in the UEFA press announcement today just as there was not a mention of Ireland in each of the last CL press releases when Sky acquired the UK rights.

I fully expect that BT Sport will have full rights to Ireland. It would also be my expectation that by the time this new contract kicks in that there will be new developments for subscribers to BT Sport both here and in the UK to allow full access to all games via a red button or similar service.

As to Ireland and a limited choice of viewing for non-BT subscribers it is quite possible that these matches could be on Setanta available FTV rather than any of the existing terrestrial stations. It will be probably next April before we know this.

Just because the present Europa League coverage is blocked on BT Sport/ESPN does not necessarily mean that this will also be the case for the next contract, after all the UK announcement today was very different from the announcement of three years ago when the Champions League contract was awarded in April 2011 and the Europa League contract in October 2011.

In conclusion I am saying that it is a mistake to assume that just because Ireland is not mentioned in any of the press releases today means that Ireland's TV deal for coverage has not already been decided. I know if I was the CEO of BT bidding this massive amount of increased revenue to UEFA today I would want some extra bundles of right's thrown it.

This is nothing to do with UEFA but a lot of people here also assumed that there would be no PL 3pm KO games available on Irish TV this season which also proved not to be the case as a result of the Murphy case involving the Portsmouth publican.

I should also add that my opinions are entirely my own and I have very often been wrong in the past and could be this time as well.

On each of the occasions mentioned by you (including today's) the reason why Irish rights weren't mentioned is/was because Irish rights hadn't/haven't been decided.

redabbey wrote: »

Did Sky subsequently have to bid extra in each of the last UEFA awarding of broadcasting contract's for Irish CL rights after they won the UK rights?

No idea but we do know that Sky aren't listed as one of the RoI TV rights holders for the 2012-15 CL - http://www.uefa.org/MultimediaFiles/Download/Publications/competitions/Marketing/01/55/41/62/1554162_DOWNLOAD.pdf

redabbey wrote: »

Could have sworn I watched a match this week on Sky. Must have been mistaken. Strange too that the Sky logo is included as a broadcaster for the next available round of matches here

http://www.uefa.com/uefachampionsleague/video/livematchcoverage/index.html

"Live match streaming and mobile coverage is provided by UEFA broadcast partners. Tune in each matchday for coverage details". No idea what their arrangement is for broadcast TV.

what's going on there with sky & the irish rights?
could setanta/rte/tv3 force sky to block them if they wished?

and how is it different from the EL, are they enforcing a block on it?

energy1942 wrote: »

I think the idea that BT Sport have no interest in ROI sounds like wishful thinking, they have bought the irish rights to everything they have with one exception Europa league football, and that was only because that was not available to them, as Irish broadcasters had exclusive rights to Europa league football, however this is not the case with the CL.

Wishful thinking?

That's a strange assumption to make - I'm from Ireland and obviously the more chances I have to watch football the better, although I'll admit as long as I can see my own team I'm not really concerned about other matches.

My contribution to this thread came about for no more or less a reason than to advise that it is not an automatic given that BT Sport will transmit their Champions League coverage into this country. I'd imagine the cost of doing so might be minimal for them so it is probably likely - but it is not a given. And if it is geo-blocked, just like in the Europa League, Irish viewers will have to accept it.

ESPN - as you've already intimated - did not take the secondary Irish rights for the Europa League, despite the channel being available to whatever amount of Irish subscribers were quoted earlier in the thread.

In addition, we are talking a whole new set of rights here, whatever's happened previously no longer (necessarily) applies. All we can really do is wait and see.

To finish, I do believe BT's coverage of the Champions League will be available here. It is just not automatically so in relation to the deal signed last week.

The Cush wrote: »

According to the UEFA 2012 press release Setanta have the right to broadcast all remaining live games after RTÉ/TV3 first picks.

How many do they broadcast each match night and do Sky broadcast the rest?

sky show 15 matches a week here, the only one they don't is the one on ITV

what i was looking to find out was how or why they are able to this - at the minute for anyone with satellite, the irish rights don't matter one iota, well from what i see anyway - when the EL is geoblocked

icdg & radiowawes touched on it, though have different opinions on how it's come about/allowed

radiowaves wrote: »

None of us really know, we can all just make educated guesses based on the evidence (m'lud).

ICDG may have hit a nail on the head. There may well be some sort of agreement in place - but maybe it's between Sky and our local broadcasters. I don't know how much RTÉ/TV3/Setanta currently pay, and whether this is low thanks to Sky's presence, but with RTÉ Two's CL coverage geo-blocked (not to mention EL into this country) it is certainly not UEFA policy to just overlook cross-border broadcasts.

Had Sky come to an agreement not to buy exclusive rights in return for no objection to co-existing rights? Did UEFA's insistence that some matches be available FTA play a part? Sky's recent Sky One experiment suggests they knew BT's massive bid was imminent and that FTA broadcasts would also be an issue.

One thing's for sure - BT don't have the same clout in Ireland as Sky do and have nothing to offer in return.

Plus, in Ireland, BT is part of the Setanta pack. In the UK it is a standalone broadcaster and broadcasts on platforms other than Sky.

How much all or any of this will affect coverage and what's allowed in this country is simply speculation, but again, my contributions are more to advise that it is not a given that we will see all or any of BT's CL coverage in this country.

Ryle nugent was quoted unofficially the last time as saying rte pay around 1million per year. this was a reduction in price compared to the last rights period.

Onthe3rdDay wrote: »

Well at that much for a market like Ireland it would be hard to make a profit. £1 million for one Match Night a week is huge money, They'd have to make about 100,000 a match night to break even. That would be doable when the english teams are playing, but if you had a season were there were no english teams in the quarter finals you could end up losing a lot of money. One night a week is worth the risk as it's unlikely, but both nights would be a big gamble, especially when a profit is likely showing repeats of Ireland's biggest Criminals or such like.

He said €1 million per year, not per match day... if it is €1 million per year (I don't know) then it seems like a bargain... its massive business here.