da premier bet： The landmark ruling by the European Court of Justice (ECJ) in favour of Portsmouth landlady Karen Murphy has sent shockwaves through the corridors of power at both Premier League and Sky HQ. So what is the next move for all concerned? Will this have a knock-on effect on how we view our football? And what does it spell out for the clubs involved in the Premier and Football League’s?
da betway： Mrs Murphy had originally been taken to court and fined £8k under the Copyright Act back in 2007 for illegally using a Greek decoder to broadcast live games. The ECJ in Luxembourg has since overturned the decision. It ruled in this way as it concluded that the sale of exclusive rights to televise football on a country-by-country basis was contrary to the principle of the European single market.
This ruling has opened up a whole can of worms and potentially means that Sky could be entered into a rights bidding war with other giants such as ESPN, Canal+ and Al Jazeera for the rights to the Premier League. It also open up the opportunity, as long as the Premier League’s logo isn’t illegally shown, of viewing 3 p.m kick offs live through a foreign decoder – something British broadcasters are banned from doing in an attempt to keep attendances high at grounds.
Former Sunderland Chairman Niall Quinn raged last season in response to a legal opinion delivered by an advocate of the ECJ, as attendances dropped at the Stadium of Light over such decoder’s being used in pubs all over the North East.
Quinn stated: “The illegal showing of Saturday 3pm fixtures involving Sunderland has an extremely detrimental effect on our attendances. I can point to the evidence uncovered by an agency who covertly visited pubs and clubs in our catchment area and witnessed thousands watching the illegal broadcasts. My belief is [that] a significant number of these people are taking the easy option of spending their money in the pub, watching their team, as opposed to supporting their team and helping to create a better atmosphere at the stadium.”
Before adding: “Our attendances are down for a couple of reasons and I would never criticise anyone who doesn’t come to the stadium because of financial constraints but I despise those who spend far more than the price of a ticket watching some overseas commentator describing the action. To anyone watching the game illegally in the pub I will continue to say: ‘By doing so you’re not supporting your team, you’re actually damaging the progress of the club.’ We have a real chance here to make this club feel great again but to do it we need everyone behind us. I would urge these people in the pubs and clubs to come back to the Stadium of Light. And I reiterate, despite this opinion yesterday, it is still illegal to show games in this fashion.” Strong words from a usually chipper fellow.
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The current rights to the Premier League expire at the end of next season and negotiation will begin in the summer. There are now several options available to those in power.
The rights could now be sold to the highest bidder across the whole of Europe as one big package – these could even be sold, due to the nature of a bidding war – at an increased price than they already are. Sky could conceivably seal the rights to every major league in Europe now depending on how negotiations go from hereon in. The Premier League could, in theory, refuse to sell the right to anybody and form their own breakaway channel, thus rendering a foreign decoder useless. However, this seems very unlikely.
Either way you look at it, it doesn’t look good in the short-term for clubs. While they may get a higher proportion of money from a potentially larger right package deal in one big lump, it in-turn could affect attendances up and down the country over the course of the season.
The knock-on effect it could have on clubs further down the line, due to Sky losing their exclusivity, could mean some clubs even go out of business further down the tiers as more and more viewers take what Quinn termed as ‘the easy option’ and stay at home.
Man Utd manager Sir Alex Ferguson last week bemoaned the influence that TV had on the game: “When you shake hands with the devil you have to pay the price. Television is God at the moment. It is king. When you see the fixture lists come out now, they [the television companies] can pick and choose whenever they want the top teams on television. You get some ridiculous situations when you’re playing on Wednesday night in Europe and then at lunchtime the following Saturday. You ask any manager if they would pick that themselves… there’d be no chance. When you think of that, I don’t think we get enough money.”
With the Premier League now broadcast to over 200 countries around the world, the last deal was negotiated back in 2009 and equates to clubs earning, on average, £4.3m for each game shown live on television.
There look to be many twists and turns further down the line as the ruling will have to be ratified in the coming months. While the viewer may have more power at their fingertips and it pushes the big conglomerates into a change of tack, the real loser here could be the clubs.
Premier League sides could potentially see a change in how much money they get, but it remains to be seen whether they’ll get any more power when it comes to fixtures as Ferguson attested to. The smaller clubs in the Football League, though, could receive a larger sum all at once and then be forced to survive on piecemeal attendances the rest of the campaign – an approach unlikely to find any favour. As recently retired band R.E.M once mused: ‘it’s the end of the world as we know it’. Maybe the prophetic Michael Stipe was onto something after all.
You can follow me on Twitter @JamesMcManus1
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