Posts Tagged → English Premier League
In October Skys TV could collapse.
I did a blog the other day about Skys TV deal and how it could be affected by European competition law in October. It’s only after some more research and some digging I’ve worked out how much it could be affected. The press did a number of stories how it could be affected but never put it into numbers. Forget the Football Governance Report and the Phone Hacking if there is something that’s going to hit someone Hard in the pocket in the next few months, it’s going to be this. Sky are estimated to have around 50,000 pub customers with many paying over £1000 a month or more to show live Premier League games. We don’t know the total value figure but that could be put a value of around £600m. The current deal between Sky and Premier League is worth something around £1.7 Billion a season. Currently if you were to install a Greek Box, your expected to pay for the year and so on which works at around £1000-1600 for box, satellite installation, HD and a 12 month subscription. Interesting thing is the card on it’s own to renew is around £995 for the year if you buy it off the installation company which works at out £80 a month. The same package from Nova directly is £45. If you buy it through a UK company that makes it 92% cheaper than a comparable Sky subscription for the year. If you get it direct from Greece it’s 95.5 cheaper.
This is where Skys big problem comes in. A few months ago the Greek broadcaster nova sports threatened to cut British customers off as it didn’t have the rights to broadcast outside of Greece but this has since changed drastically. Since hearing the European Court of Justices likely outcome, they have plans to directly market their products in the UK. Even for home users this makes the market more competitive. Currently with Sky the Sky Sports package is £50 with the same package only being £45 from Nova which also happens to show the 3pm games. If Nova are allowed to market directly to pubs, at 95.5 cheaper rate and are also given the chance to air 3pm games there is no way the current deal is worth £1.7 Billion in the UK. It would clearly no longer be exclusive and the pub market value and prices should in theory drop drastically.
Football Governance and Premier League Coming Under Pressure….
The phone hacking inquiry has allowed the football goverance inquiry report to be put back two weeks. It was due out on the 18th of July which was the Monday just gone but the release date is now the 29th July which is next Friday. Hopefully this should allow for full weekend coverage in the press.
The was also an article in the financial times which mentioned just one of a number of measures set to be imposed on the Premier League by the Government Report. What is surprising is the independent chairman believes there is nothing wrong within the game. Those are the sorts of independent directors who do nothing for the game. The people given these roles should believe there is a problem and have the governments & fans interest at heart. It’s completely pointless to appoint someone who believes everything is perfectly fine the way it is.
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/2388e3ce-b15e-11e0-9444-00144feab49a.html#axzz1SkdiQTmd
Stories Of The Week….
So far this week I’ve nearly seen it all, apart from Glazer leaving. Abit of FC United, Manchester United, Liverpools new American owners(where I think they are going) and one or two other pieces. I think I’ll start with last nights Rochdale Vs FC United Game for starters. I think all United fans will relate to this in some way or another. Am not saying your a fan(I am not myself, MUFC for me), but alot I’ve spoken too find it very interesting. Even the die hard reds. Unless you’ve been living under a rock or live on the other side of the world, which is possible if you’ve come from twitter. FC United have made it into the second round of the FA Cup, which to me is unbelievable. They won 3-2 with a injury time goal.
Here is a quote from me…. “I know its asking for alot and most FC United fans will say it won’t happen for many years, if ever but at this moment in time there is that tiny chance. Maths says a 1st round win, then a 2nd round win into a draw with Premier League sides.” …. lets change that to, 2nd round win into a draw with Premier League sides. I’ll leave it at that.
From my last review of Manchester United I’d say its been a slow start but we’re not losing which is always important. I might be the first to say this but could United be running into a small bit of form. Since the shocking second half against West Brom, United have won 5 on the bounce. Won 3 cup games and 2 League games. The game in Turkey the other night was the most impressive so far. I only say the start of form because they need to prove in the league they can do well in the next few games. These include Wolves tomorrow, which from fans I’ve spoken to no expect less than 3 goals from the strike force. The big one is City away. With City losing 3 on the bounce, am hoping we can get a good win today, then go and put a proper show of football on midweek.
One other interesting thing which is floating around is over in Anfield. You’ll likely want to hear something else but considering that another group of Americans have took over an English club. Its relevant when looking at owners as a whole. This time the Americans seem to be increasingly open talk to the press. I get the feeling they don’t really know what they are doing and in areas they’ve admitted that. This gives me a real insight into the people in the game. They’ve just got a new manager and now new owners. Dan Roan from the BBC asked them alot of questions yesterday. The ones that stood out to me were the 39th game question and language used. The term ‘EPL’ like ‘NFL’ was used alot. Later on there were other questions asked around the club its self. All I heard was ‘we want to increase revenues’. Where have we heard that before! The Glazers? Tom Hicks? Anyone. It basically means putting ticket prices up and selling more shirts. On the new stadium, I believe there is a strong possibility of a future ground share. Liverpool fans don’t want it? Tough. You wanted more American owners. You got em and if the Everton Kirby stadium was only going to cost around £78m for a 50k stadium as part of a larger £240m development, the new Americans will bite Evertons hands off. If they can half the cost with Everton, instead of spending a risky £300m development, they can spend possibly less than 1/3 of that and get the extra 10,000-30,000 seats they wanted to milk more cows. These Americans aren’t stupid and will milk them, like they are milking United. Theres one other thing, if your a Liverpool fan reading this (I don’t know why you would be reading this) at home feeling all happy about no more debt. First thing I’d be doing is digging to find out just where that money came from to buy the club. All of that will come clear over the next year or so, apart from the ticket prices. Yep, they’ll be going up.
One week ago we had the ‘United Against Glazer’ protest, an important article involving Jeremy Hunt midweek but I’ve also had one or two other interesting things come up. I won’t make them public just yet but they’ll come out during the week, so keep an eye out. Might not be big or that exciting but there interesting nonetheless. The protest and the Jeremy Hunt comments are very important and hopefully you’ve read the past blog posts, if not just go down the page. As ever my comments repeating the pressuring of your local MP, The Government, Number 10, The Sports Minster, The FA and PL all still stand strong. Go for it.
For any questions or comments you can follow me on Twitter @wewantglazerout