So we all know that Setanta has ceased trading in England, Wales and Scotland, however it is still operating in the Republic of Ireland, Northern Ireland, USA, Canada, Australia and Africa. Now what does this mean for the distribution of the Premier League's live UK television rights? Previously Premier League TV rights were split into six packages, each consisting of 23 live matches, making a total of 138 games being screened on live television each Football season.
Now you may think that this is not a big deal, and some big shot company like Sky will just reap the profits and monopolize the market holding all six packages for the season....but you'd be wrong. Industry regulators demand that the six packages must be split between more than one broadcaster, so in actual fact there must be a direct competitor to Sky as no single broadcaster are able to own all six packages. This deal was agreed in 2005 with the European Commission. Previously Sky, held four of the six packages(this will be held for the 09-10 season), meaning that the British broadcaster will show 92 live matches next season.
The remaining two packages of 46 games, which were previously held by Setanta were taken over by American broadcaster, ESPN. You may also recall that there were talks of ESPN bailing out Setanta.....guess they had other plans in mind. ESPN have launched a new channel to screen the newly-acquired live matches, that consumers will be able to purchase on top of their current Sky TV subscription as well as other British providers such as Virgin media.
Now this is for the current season.....what will happen in the 2010-2011 season is a different story, my guess is that Sky will attempt to gain more of the games from ESPN. Possibly upping their number of games from 92 to 115 or so, leaving ESPN with 23 games. May that be the case or not, we may be in for a power struggle in the coming year between New commers to the GB premier league ESPN and GB veterans Sky!
No comments:
Post a Comment