"Sky Sports to be the home of the EFL"

[Robbie]

"EFL clubs have unanimously approved a record domestic rights deal with Sky Sports over a five-year period with over 1000 matches to be broadcast each season – a record number of games for any club football agreement.

Running from season 2024/25 to 2028/29, the arrangement will be made up of guaranteed payments of £895m and £40m in marketing benefits".

 

[Robbie]

I don't think that this is a good deal for supporters.

It appears that the streaming your favourite team by Ifollow is a casualty of this new deal and with more games being covered, that will mean less 3pm kick off games for the supporter.

The EFL will get more money from Sky but it is still minute compared to the £6.7 billion Sky deal with the PL.

The Ifollow for £10 a match is really good for supporters to watch their team. Looks like that is going.

I am not happy that Sky is just about becoming a monopoly for watching domestic football on the TV and online. It is not good for the spectator, nor is it good for competition.

 

 

 

[Wheelbarrow repair man]

Do you think there'll be many League 1 or League 2 matches Robbie? My guess most matches covered will be in the Championship and Top of League 1 clashes with the odd League 2 game thrown in I don't see many mid to lower League 2 matches being covered though.

[Robbie]

@Wheelbarrow repair man

These are the number of matches from each league that Sky day they will televise live.

Quoted from their website 

"Each League weekend fixture round will see 10 live EFL fixtures shown. Five matches will be shown from the Sky Bet Championship and supporters of Sky Bet League One and League Two teams will now benefit from greater coverage than ever before with five of their games being broadcast live. For the first time ever, fans will be also able to watch every match from the Carabao Cup and EFL Trophy"

But the Championship gets the  majority of live matches.

And our Ifollow will go.

I would have thought the clubs would have wanted to have supporters, who can't get to matches, an opportunity to watch their team's live game.

It would bring revenue directly to the club. But we seem to be going backwards in that respect. Supporters have been shafted once again.

[menzinho]

They are going to broadcast a minimum of 248 L2 games! That’s 45% of the season’s games! Quite a dramatic jump in interest given they’ve shown about 30 L2 games this season…

Looks to be quite a financial gain, and that’ll only serve to drive a larger gap between the NL and EFL. From a purely selfish and just Notts perspective it’s probably good for us. For the wider game in general, it’s not great. I’ve always thought a free-to-air channel should get some sport throughout the season, particularly lower league football. It always made me laugh when on BT they used to advertise a Champions League fixture mid-game between the likes of Maidenhead and Barnet…

[Robbie]

11 minutes ago, menzinho said:

They are going to broadcast a minimum of 248 L2 games! That’s 45% of the season’s games! Quite a dramatic jump in interest given they’ve shown about 30 L2 games this season…

@menzinho They are only going to broadcast 5 live matches per week from both the league 1 and 2. The Ifollow live match of your team at £10 a time is going.

Not good 

[Wheelbarrow repair man]

Shafted is the Right word Robbie, because if Ifollow does go then any club involved in a season long Relegation Battle aren't going to get any of their matches shown, so their fans wont be able to follow their team live should they be unable to attend the match and their Club wont get any source of income and more Clubs will find themselves in Financial Dire Straights ( I could do a Rock Band remark here but I wont)

[Robbie]

@Wheelbarrow repair manYes absolutely.

And get this.

PL deal £6.7 Billion

EFL over three leagues 

£895 million 

That's just 13.35% of the PL deal.

Massive disparity there.

The EFL have agreed to receive the scraps and they actually think it's a good deal.

[DangerousSausage]

If I understood it correctly, all matches that fall outside the Saturday 3pm blackout (i.e. that would have been available in the UK on iFollow) will be broadcast live, so you should be able to watch the team as before. The question is whether there will be a match pass similar to iFollow, or whether Sky will gouge you for about 30 quid a month for it. Rupert Murdoch is not a philanthropist, all that money is coming from somewhere...

As for us exiles, things should stay broadly the same. But I wonder if we'll have Sky's commentators inflicted on us?

[Robbie]

@DangerousSausage As I read it the club streaming service provided through Ifollow is being discontinued, but there needs to be clearer clarification of this.

Sky are pushing a non contract sky sports streaming service for £26 a month on a 6 month minimum term, but following live streaming of each club on a matchday for example, Notts matches, isn't mentioned.

[menzinho]

Yes @Robbie thanks for the correction, I misread the sentence the 248 games will be broadcast over a period of 5 years! I thought they'd have done well to show to 248 games in one season!