[quote=“The Dunph”]
So essentially you haven’t a clue if they’ve replaced Setanta?[/quote]
Replaced? Can you not grasp the fact they’re a separate entity? You’re going on my enemy list.
Have they or have they not filled the void left in the market by the Setanta collapse?
Technically you could argue the case that they’ve “replaced” Setanta…
[quote=“The Dunph”]Have they or have they not filled the void left in the market by the Setanta collapse?
Technically you could argue the case that they’ve “replaced” Setanta…[/quote]
Even though Setanta still exist?
Setanta 2, Setanta 3, Setanta Golf and Setanta Sports News are all extinct.
Setanta is a shell of what it once was.
ESPN buys Uefa Europa League rights
Rights to Uefa Europa League competition previously held by Setanta bought by ESPN in joint deal with Channel Five
ESPN has snapped up the rights previously held by Setanta for the new Uefa Europa League, which will replace the Uefa Cup from this season.
The Disney-owned sports broadcaster, which also acquired Setanta’s live English Premiership matches when the company’s English operations went into administration in June, will share rights to the Europa League competition with Channel Five.
ESPN has done a three-year deal, with the first matches due to be broadcast from later this month. The final is in May next year.
Sides involved include current Uefa Cup holders Shakhtar Donetsk, Roma, Lazio, Valencia, Ajax, PSV, Benfica and Sporting Lisbon, while those of British interest will include Celtic, Everton and Fulham.
The group stage features 48 clubs, including 10 eliminated in the playoff round of Uefa Champions League qualifiers last month. The ties will begin on 17 September and will be broadcast on Wednesday and Thursday nights throughout the season.
As part of the deal, ESPN will serve as host broadcaster for any live home matches featuring British clubs that it is transmitting.
Jeroen Oerlemans, the ESPN vice president of TV channels in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, said: “This deal shows that we continue to build a fantastic offering of local and international sport for fans around the UK.”
A Uefa spokesman added: “We are delighted to have signed this deal with ESPN in respect of the Uefa Europa League rights in the United Kingdom. ESPN’s new sports channel complements the launch of this exciting competition and will provide UK football fans with additional top quality live football.”
In addition to the Europa League, ESPN’s live football content this season includes 46 games from the Barclays Premier League, 30 from the Clydesdale Bank Scottish Premier League and up to 80 from the Italian Serie A. The channel also airs live football from the German Bundesliga, Dutch Eredivisie, Portuguese Liga, Russian Premier League and American MLS.
How much is ESPN? Is it worth getting? Setanta still has the Magners League, a useful tool for it.
Whats happening with the NFL coverage does anybody know? I can’t find anything other than Five have Sunday Night Football.
It’s still up in the air.
I can’t see Sky not having the 6pm and 9pm games on Sunday as well as the playoffs etc…
RTE didn’t have money to cover Irish cricket match against England, Tour Of Ireland and we very nearly didn’t get to see most important Irish match in ten years yet they can afford to splash more money at EPL. I’m sure usual argument will be spun about lack of interest in cricket, cycling etc but that argument should really be put to bed when one looks at poor viewing figures for EPL. Cost benefit analysis would be interesting.
RTÉ Television has secured the rights to broadcast Barclays Premier League soccer highlights for three seasons up to and including the 2012/2013 season.
RTÉ TV’s team of analysts and commentators will deliver in excess of 40 programmes per season covering the widest possible range of Premier League matches throughout the next three years.
Ryle Nugent, Deputy Head of Sport of RTÉ Television said: 'We’re delighted to continue to show the best of the Barclays Premier League action so that the widest possible audience can enjoy the success of Irish footballers in the league along with all the top class football free-to-air.
‘The strength of our expert analysis and the uniquely Irish perspective that our pundits offer on the league continues to prove a favourite for fans, with over 200,000 viewers tuning in to the top-rated programme last season.’
Richard Scudamore, Chief Executive, Premier League said: ‘The Premier League is extremely pleased that RTÉ has invested in our highlights rights for seasons 2010/11 - 2012/13. They will continue to provide excellent coverage of the Barclays Premier League to our many fans across Ireland.’
Big win for Sky over the BBC today. Doubt they’ll be “sharing” coverage for much longer
Wouldn’t be too sure about that Mac. I think this kind of set up is quite common for US golf, whereby ESPN would show Thursday and Friday, before one of the free to air channels would show the weekend action.
Now that this pile of crap is on Sky it hopefully won’t be long before it fades into the obscurity it deserves.
.
Pub owner in the UK taking on the EPL/FA over tv rights so she can show satellite tv in her pub.
She has a decent chance apparently.
Premier League face potential ‘Bosman’ of TV rights
By Adrian Goldberg
Presenter, 5 live Investigates
The European Court of Justice will this week hear a landmark case brought by a Portsmouth-based pub landlord, which could change the landscape of how sports broadcasting rights are sold across Europe.
Five years ago, Karen Murphy would try to draw punters to her Portsmouth pub, The Red, White and Blue, by showing Premier League football matches on the pub TV.
However, she found the monthly subscription to Sky Sports increasingly unaffordable - pubs can pay more than £1,000 a month.
Instead, she found a cheaper means of screening English football - a subscription to a Greek satellite broadcaster, NOVA. This imported satellite card was around one 10th of the cost Karen was paying to BSkyB.
She says she’s not the only one saving money in this way:
"I think you’ll find that most publicans will try and find another way of showing football. In fact quite a lot of them do.
“I think it’s only the larger chains that can afford to pay the Sky prices. A lot of pubs have taken Sky out - they simply can’t afford it.”
However, using these foreign subscription cards puts publicans like Ms Murphy in breach of UK copyright law, because the means by which they screen football is not via the authorised broadcaster - Sky Sports.
I think it’s a greedy private company trying to dictate to the small people what they can and can not do, purely for profit”
As a result, Ms Murphy was taken to court and ended up having to pay nearly £8,000 in fines and costs after being caught by enforcers working on behalf of Football Association Premier League Limited (FAPL) - the private company which represents the broadcasting interests of the 20 English Premier League clubs.
Five years on from her first appearance in a magistrates court, she has taken her appeal all the way to the grand chamber of the European Court of Justice (ECJ) - a court reserved only for the most complex and important cases of European law.
“I think it’s unjust. I think it’s a greedy private company trying to dictate to the small people what they can and cannot do, purely for profit,” she told 5 live Investigates.
“The law needs changing. If I don’t fight who is going to fight?”
Sitting in her pub, she puts her case into perspective:
“If I wanted to go and buy a car, I could go to any garage I like. Me, as a publican, if I want to show football, I can only go to the Sky garage, and have to pay 10 times the price of anybody else [in Europe]. I don’t believe that’s fair.”
The case Ms Murphy is taking to the ECJ is based on freedom of trade.
The use of imported satellite decoders is undermining the exclusivity of Sky’s £1.8bn deal
She claims by restricting her choice of satellite TV providers to a single broadcaster - BSkyB - the Premier League contravenes European Union principles of free movement of goods and services between member states of the EU.
Furthermore, such practice also prevents free and open competition in the UK broadcast market.
If Ms Murphy wins, the future value of the Premier League’s broadcasting rights could be undermined.
“The Premier League is probably the most aggressive defender of its copyright in the world of sport,” says analyst Frank Dunne, acting editor of TVSportsMarkets.com.
Without this protection it is the consumer, or fans as we prefer, that ultimately suffer ”
"The Premier League’s action is part of a wider battle to protect its copyright, which is being fought on three fronts.
“First, is the battle against UK pubs showing matches from foreign satellite services. Second, there’s the battle to stop pirate coverage of league matches being streamed online using peer-to-peer technology. Third is the battle against unauthorised use of match clips on YouTube.”
The Premier League says this fight to protect its interests is about maintaining standards:
“Without this protection it is the consumer, or fans as we prefer, that ultimately suffer as the investment in quality content will inevitably be diminished. It is also unfair on those licensees that respect the law.”
While some 80,000 unauthorised internet streams of football matches have been shut down over the past two years, the FAPL has not always been successful in its pursuit of those it deems to have infringed its copyright and earlier this year failed in its attempt to sue YouTube in a US court.
However, the Premier League says the forthcoming ECJ hearing will provide an opportunity to clear up issues that have long been used to confuse publicans and licensees.
The money generated from the sale of Premier League rights has revolutionised English football
The FAPL also has the endorsement of BSkyB, which told the BBC:
“This is primarily a case about how rights are licensed to broadcasters across Europe. While Sky is not a party to this case, we welcome the Premier League’s determination to seek a definitive ruling on this issue.”
But the impact of a decision against the FAPL cannot be overestimated, according to Mr Dunne.
He says: “This case has the potential to become the Bosman of broadcasting.” The Bosman ruling was another landmark decision made by the ECJ in 1995, which had a profound effect on the transfer of professional football players within the EU.
This case has the potential to become the Bosman of broadcasting”
A decision against the Premier League would lead to a similarly radical shake-up in the way the broadcasting industry works.
“The doomsday scenario for rights-holders [such as the Premier League] is that their ability to sell their content on an exclusive basis by individual European territory, charging different rights fees according to the size of the individual market, will be undermined,” says Mr Dunne.
"Nobody seems really sure how rights sales would work if that system were ruled to be in breach of European law on the free movement of goods and services.
“The Premier League is confident that it is going into the case with strong arguments. But it was also confident of its arguments when doing battle with YouTube in the New York courts, and it lost that one.”
One criticism of the current market model is that the FAPL insists that broadcasters include clauses in their subscription contracts with consumers that forbid the use of broadcasters’ decoder cards outside the designated territory. The effect of such restrictions is that it creates territorial monopolies.
However, should Karen Murphy win, it is possible that these territorial monopolies could be consolidated further.
Because if football rights - or any media rights - have to be sold on a Europe-wide basis, then only a handful of companies will be able to afford to bid.
What this will mean for the average consumer is not clear but up to now the money generated from the sale of broadcast rights of Premier League matches has revolutionised English football, turning it into the most lucrative league in the world.
Anything which undermines this revenue stream is seen as potentially harmful to the future success of English football, and concerns over the use of foreign satellite decoders is not limited to copyright infringement.
Anyone using the imported boxes can side-step the Premier League’s Saturday afternoon broadcasting blackout.
Officially, no UK-based broadcaster can show premiership football at the traditional kick-off time of 1500. This is because the Premier League wants to encourage attendance at live games.
However, European broadcasters do not have to abide by this restriction and the foreign decoders allow landlords to show games that are prohibited to Sky subscribers.
So, does Karen Murphy think her case is potentially damaging to the game?
“I’m not damaging football. Football is damaging itself by dictating when matches are shown. Supporters don’t want a match on a Tuesday night - which suits the broadcaster - they want a match on a Saturday afternoon. The whole thing has got way out of control. It’s pure greed.”
Ahead of the ECJ hearing, which begins on Tuesday, the Premier League is remaining tight-lipped.
In a statement it said: “It is not appropriate for us to comment in any detail on this matter given the close proximity of the ECJ hearing, however after this process has been concluded we will, of course, place our full position on record.”
But how confident is Karen Murphy? Does she think she will win her case?
“Absolutely. I think I should have freedom of choice. It’s not like I went to buy something illegal. I just went to buy it from a different company. I just made a choice.”
Fair fooking play to her, hope she wins. My hunch is that the internet spell’s the end of TV rights for sport (as we know them now) as it has practically done for the music industry but this auld biddy might speed it up a bit
Barely noteworthy but BBC lost the rights to the World Athletics Championships to C4 the other day.
Cumann Lúthchleas Gael has today announced details arising from the recent tender process for GAA media rights (Television and Radio) for 2011-2014.
In relation to television, RTÉ will broadcast 31 Championship games and TV3 will cover nine, totaling 40 GAA Championship matches to be broadcast live annually.
TV3 will also broadcast both minor All-Ireland finals.
TG4 will air Sunday Allianz League games and Setanta will have the rights to Saturday games in the same competition.
TG4 will also have the rights to broadcast club and colleges games and have also secured a new mid-week package of live Wednesday night games from the Ulster Bank Third Level Colleges Competitions and the Cadburys U21 Football Championship.
In radio, RTÉ remain the primary rights holder and for the first time Newstalk have been awarded live broadcast rights for second choice Championship games.
“We are delighted with the high interest in the broadcast rights for our games and we believe this is the correct balance between showing live games and our commitment to supporting club activity.” stated Uachtarán Chumann Lúthchleas Gael Criostóir Ó Cuana.
He added: “We would like to thank our broadcast partners for their continued interest in bringing our games to GAA supporters and would also like to welcome Newstalk who will be GAA media partners for the first time.”
The GAA will now go to tender for international rights.
Will the minor finals still be broadcast in Irish? They better be. We don’t need any more McKenna and Cooney-instigated “progress” bullshit.
Broadcasting them on a different channel seems a strange and rather stupid move to me. The same channel should broadcast the whole of All-Ireland Final Day, they shouldn’t split it up.
Does this also mean that both of them will have to get full camera access on the day?
Two separate studios set up, etc.
Seems a bit stupid.
Presumably. Leinster Football Semi Finals this year were played on the same bill but on different channels. Dublin v Meath was on TV3 and then Louth v Westmeath was on RTE. I don’t know did RTE use a studio in the stadium though.
40 matches overall looks a bit on the low side, should be 50.
Finals - 2
Semi Finals - 4
Quarter Finals - 6
Provincial Finals - 6
Football Qualifiers - 4? - it was much more than that this year etween both channels
Hurling Qualifiers - 2?
That leaves 16 matches in the provincial championships before the provincial finals, which is too low. In Ulster alone every match has been broadcast live for the last few years. Maybe BBC will continue to do that on their own.