[Archived] Champions League exclusive to BT Sport

[Lhrover]

I think any game that involves an English team on TV that is not free is a great shame to the people of Britain, it's no wonder we have less English talent in the premier league.

[thenodrog]

I think any game that involves an English team on TV that is not free is a great shame to the people of Britain, it's no wonder we have less English talent in the premier league.

A rather naive viewpoint lhrover unless you are referring to the actual England team rather than an English team. Why should anybody do anything other than watch for free? Where would the income to pay these overpaid stars and their entourages come from? There does need to be a middle ground.

[Stuart]

A rather naive viewpoint lhrover unless you are referring to the actual England team rather than an English team. Why should anybody do anything other than watch for free? Where would the income to pay these overpaid stars and their entourages come from? There does need to be a middle ground.

If he's not referring to the England team then I'm not sure which 'English team" he might be referring to. Certainly not above League One.

[Paul]

And that's the point people seem to be missing among all the "it's fair competition, Sky have done it for years" comments.

Rather than reinvest in infrastructure or (god forbid) give something back to its customers, BT has decided to sink its cash reserve into a sport that's widely considered to be an obscene waste of money.

Their long-term milking of a customer base that exists largely because of people's reluctance to change suppliers in the post-monopoly era meant BT could bid three times what Sky thought the rights were worth.

I don't have an axe to grind on this though I do benefit from free PL games as a longtime BT broadband customer - I've watched three so it's hardly a big influence on my view. I happened to catch the CE of BTSport, Gavin Patterson(?) on the Radio 4 Media Show this week. It was clear from his comments BT see themselves as an evolving company believing they have to become a media based enterprise with a focus on delivering TV. That's quite interesting because as I see it, and I could be wrong, Sky began as a TV company and have developed in to a company providing broadband etc. BT are looking to do the reverse.

It was also clear BT will be charging for CL football at prices which at least compete with Sky and are probably lower. I very much doubt broadband and phone costs will increase to pay for BTSport, if only because Offcom and millions of customers would be very unhappy.

I can't see a problem in a TV monopoly era led by and dominated by Sky we suddenly have a new player who may have innovative ideas. If the policy of PPV established on the entertainment side continues it's going to be a big plus in my eyes. I've never been happy with Sky preventing me from watching sport which used to be available on terrestial - now we have Sky subscribers unhappy because someone else has nicked the CL and potentially other football, there's a certain irony in that.

[M-K]

now we have Sky subscribers unhappy because someone else has nicked the CL and potentially other football, there's a certain irony in that.

That's not what my issue with this is. If it was just a case of having to go to a different company, I'd have no problem doing that. I don't care if it's Sky, Virgin, BT, Netflix or whoever, I have no allegiance to any of them.

What I'm annoyed about is the piecemeal way it's all getting divided up, which means I'd have to pay multiple subscriptions to get the content I used to be able to get for one price. A Sky sub and a TV licence used to get me all the domestic and European games. Now they expect me to pay a BT fee on top of all that, for exactly the same content. More money, less value.

[Stuart]

If it brings down prices Paul, I'd agree. But it won't.

What I don't quite understand is the value in CL games. Do they think that Man U, Arsenal, Chelsea and City fans will fund it? Or do they believe that the ITV-armchair-neutral-fan is going to pay the extra? If Man U don't qualify it'll be a big dent in their target audience, surely?