The EPL on Feb. 10 signed a new domestic TV deal worth £5.1B ($7.8B). The record contract has dominated int’l headlines in the days since it was signed. The value of the Premier League’s TV deal previously jumped from £1.8B ('10-13) to £3B ('13-16) during the last TV rights auction, which took place in '12. The new deal features seven packages, with Sky securing five and BT winning the other two -- for Saturday evening matches and midweek games -- at a cost of £960M ($1.48B). Sky won the right to broadcast the Premier League’s key Sunday afternoon matches, among others, by paying £4.2B ($6.5B). Sky will carry 126 of 168 games, with BT carrying the other 42.The £5.1B price tag is £2B ($3B) more than the current three-year agreement. This 71% increase follows the 70% leap taken during the ’12 auction. It is being estimated that the total amount once the league sells its int’l rights for the same period could top £8.5B ($13B). EPL CEO RICHARD SCUDAMORE said the day the agreement was reached, "These are huge companies doing huge things in a market that has gone way beyond football.” Others in the U.K. who have weighed in on the impact of the deal include top execs at both Sky and BT, various finance and media analysts and many of the biggest names associated with the EPL. Conversations regarding the deal have touched on topics ranging from what Sky and BT subscribers could be charged to ticket prices for matches to whether this should increase how clubs compensate their lowest-paid staffers. Reactions from Scotland have included calls for a percentage of the deal to be allocated to Scottish football. The deal has also drawn notable remarks from several of the Premier League’s top competitors in Europe, including La Liga and the Bundesliga.
Scudamore: “Am I surprised? Of course, the little old Premier League, doing quite well here. Look, you laugh, but the reality is that compared with BT and Sky we are. I continue to be surprised by every television deal really, in some ways” (London TELEGRAPH, 2/10).
Virgin Media CEO TOM MOCKRIDGE: “You can't blame the Premier League -- they are simply exploiting the sales process. But this is hurting fans and does not warrant an exemption from normal competition law rules. There are other and better ways to structure the auction -- selling more games gives more value for money and selling non-exclusively to broadcasters would take some of the heat out of auction process” (BBC, 2/10).
Bernstein analyst CLAUDIO ASPESI: “The trajectory is unsustainable. It feels like everybody lost” (FINANCIAL TIMES, 2/10).
Jefferies equity analyst JERRY DELLIS: "Investors may also question whether it was necessary to pay so much when neither BT nor anyone else seems to have been bidding ambitiously for more than two packages. Even if Sky recovers half the additional £300 million ($457M) outlay, the overrun would still account for around 10 percent of group net income in 2017-18” (FT, 2/11).
Hargreaves Lansdown Head of Equities RICHARD HUNTER: "Sky has paid dearly and is going to have to squeeze costs and customers to keep its finances on track. BT has ended up with a good hand -- Premiership, Champions League, FA Cup and European leagues -- all for a fraction of the annual cost that Sky is paying for its Premiership position” (London INDEPENDENT, 2/11).
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Lord Sugar
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Former Tottenham Chair
LORD SUGAR: “We don't have a chance of winning the World Cup again. … In a way, it's positive for the teams, but I think it's pretty negative for the future of international football for England. The Premier League hierarchy have done a good deal in squeezing the most amount of money out of the TV broadcasters in the U.K. and worldwide. I suppose yes, they're happy. Will they be happy in year's time when they realize all the money they have got, they've given to players and players' agents is another story. … Football was never started as a business” (
BBC, 2/11).
BT Consumer CEO JOHN PETTER: “You can spend so much time thinking about the tactics that you can lose sight of the fundamentals and what matters. What matters is what my customers want and what they’re prepared to pay. That’s why we’re so happy and this is a good result for us" (London GUARDIAN, 2/11).
Generate Sponsorship Managing Partner RUPERT PRATT: "This takes the pressure off the clubs with regards to sponsorship, which has been a buyer’s market with much less inflation" (MARKETING MAGAZINE, 2/11).
Media analyst CLAIRE ENDERS: “The Premier League is going to take on the characteristic of a loss leader for many broadcasters. But the element of live coverage is ever-more important” (AP, 2/12).
Pinsent Masons sports lawyer TREVOR WATKINS: "You will see a continued interest in English football being an important part of an investment strategy globally" (AP, 2/12).
Arsenal Manager ARSENE WENGER: “The movement of the players is always linked with the economical and financial power in the countries. When I was a coach in Monaco we bought the English players because we were the first to have the television money. Today, the biggest financial power is in England and the best players come to England" (BBC, 2/13).
POLITICIANS VOICE CONCERNS
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Helen Grant
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U.K. Sports Minister
HELEN GRANT: “It is also vital that clubs are run responsibly and sustainably” (
BBC, 2/11).
U.K. Shadow Sports Minister CLIVE EFFORD: “We've got the richest league in the world and precious little of the money is actually reaching the grassroots of the sport. At the outset, the Premier League gave an undertaking to the government that they would put five percent of TV rights into grassroots sports. That just hasn't happened" (BBC, 2/11).
Tottenham Labour MP DAVID LAMMY: “[Scudamore] should not just feel uncomfortable, he should feel ashamed. This is conscious greed, plain and simple” (GUARDIAN, 2/11).
IN SCOTLAND
Scottish Championship side Alloa Athletic Chair MIKE MULRANEY: “We’ve got to look at what these broadcast deals are and make a decision in Scottish football if we are being treated appropriately. Ten percent of the funding for these contracts comes out of Scotland and if you look at BT and Sky, those are commercial contracts and you can understand that we've got to negotiate commercially” (STV, 2/11).
Former Scottish Premiership side Aberdeen and Everton CEO KEITH WYNESS: “I think the whole rise and success of Sky’s coverage of the Premier League in England has probably been one of the biggest influences, affecting the demise of the Scottish game over the last ten years or so" (STV, 2/11).
AROUND EUROPE
Ligue 1 side St. Etienne co-President BERNARD CAIAZZO: “The Premier League will become the NBA of football. It will be greater than the Champions League. Clubs such as Manchester United or Chelsea will have budgets of €700 million ($794M) or €800 million ($908M). What is happening in England will impact on Germany, Italy, Spain. And I do not imagine that UEFA will not react. But there will be a greater attention if the request comes from Bayern [Munich], Real [Madrid] , Barcelona or Milan instead of St. Etienne" (GUARDIAN, 2/12).
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Christian Seifert
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German Football League (DFL) CEO
CHRISTIAN SEIFERT: “If you look at the German TV market, it will not be possible any time soon for the Bundesliga to sell its rights for that much money. We need to have an honest discussion about it: Are we prepared to head towards unpopular options in order to make sure that we can still attract the world's best players to the Bundesliga?" (
DW, 2/11).
Spanish Football League (LFP) President JAVIER TEBAS: "We have a serious problem. We won't be the best league in a year. We're going to lose a lot of value in the market because the Premier League is going to snap up all of the global TV competition and contracts. ... Unless we urgently move towards centralized TV rights sales, Spanish football is going to have a very serious problem. Economically we'll end up with a fifth-level competition" (BBC, 2/13).
