Events | 2009.10.05
Firm defends web-only football
Perform says pay-per-view plan for Ukraine v England match represents future of broadcasting, despite criticism
The company behind the decision to show England\'s World Cup qualifier in Ukraine exclusively on a pay-per-view basis via newspaper websites insisted today it represented the future of sports broadcasting in the face of criticism from supporters\' groups and MPs.
Fans will be asked to pay between £4.99 and £11.99, depending on when they sign up, to watch the match on their computer and it will also be screened in selected Odeon cinemas.
Sports rights agency Kentaro, which had a long-term deal with the Ukranian FA to market the rights, revealed last month that it planned to work with online sports broadcaster Perform to show the match live online after not receiving any bids for the match from conventional broadcasters.
At the time, some broadcasters suspected it was a stalking horse designed to force up the price but, having not received an acceptable offer, the company has vowed to press ahead with the plan.
The game was left without a TV broadcaster after Setanta, which held the rights to England\'s away matches through a deal with Kentaro, collapsed in June.
Mark Perryman, Englandfans spokesman, attacked the idea: "I find it outrageous. FIFA and UEFA should make it a condition of entry to World Cup and European Championship qualifying campaigns that games must be sold only free-to-air, both to the home market and the away market. Where England fans are being sold short is not in this instance by their own FA, but by foreign FAs selling the game to the highest bidder, and in this instance it\'s an internet outfit."
Perform has signed up partners, including the Sun, the Times, News of the World, the Daily Mail, the Daily Telegraph, the Daily Express, the Daily Star, the Independent, Virgin Media and Orange, to market the match through their websites on a revenue-share basis.
"In six months\' or a year\'s time this will be ordinary business," said Kentaro chief executive Philipp Grothe. "I have received a lot of calls from people around the globe who are looking into this. It\'s not a one-off trial here."
The FA, in particular, is likely to be keeping a close eye on the success of the experiment as it attempts to fill a £75m hole in its budget caused by the collapse of Setanta.
Perform has also signed a deal with online bookmaker Bet365, which will offer the game to new customers for nothing if they open an account and deposit £10. Perform chairman Andrew Croker said the number of potential viewers would be capped at 1 million to ensure the technical quality of the stream.
"Everybody is watching sport on the internet. A lot of rights holders are looking at it and I think this will be the catalyst for a lot of people looking at bigger events. We are going away from linear television to pay-per-view television," he said.
The timing of the experiment is interesting in view of the forthcoming government review of listed events, due to be delivered by former FA executive director David Davies within weeks. ITV and the BBC both argued in their submissions that all home-nation qualifiers, home and away, should be added to the list.
It is understood that the BBC did make a last-ditch bid for the live rights, which insiders described as "competitive", but its offer was considered far too low by Kentaro, which saw it as out of step with the price paid for other recent England away matches.
Liberal Democrat culture, media and sport spokesman Don Foster added to the criticism.
"Using the internet is an innovative idea, and a potential model for the future. But the reality is that many fans will miss out because they don\'t have internet access at home and their local pub cannot easily screen the game," he said.
"This is just another example of football\'s love affair with money – making a fast buck always takes priority over the interests of the fans."
But those behind the plan point to figures showing that more than eight in 10 households now have a high-speed internet connection and argue that most consumers are now used to watching video online via the BBC iPlayer and YouTube. Croker admitted that its biggest live audience to date was 50,000 for some Serie A matches but promised the UK\'s broadband network would be able to cope.
"This is an important match but not a critical match. If this was critical to England qualifying we\'d be having a bit more of an emotional debate about this, but as it is we are having more of an analytical debate about the future of television," said Croker.
The criticism is likely to intensify, however, if Kentaro does not agree a deal to offer highlights on terrestrial television. Kentaro said it was "not currently in negotations" with any broadcasters over selling on the rights to highlights.
Sven Goran Eriksson, the former England manager who will join presenter James Richardson in the studio before the match, said that showing matches live on the web was commonplace in his native Sweden. "It\'s different, of course, but you have to ask yourself what was the alternative? And it must be better than not seeing it anywhere, I think."
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