Owen Gibsonand Richard Wrayon the growing battle between sport's big two television broadcasters
Five weeks before the 2007-08 Premier League football season kicks-off, Setanta is making a grab for Britain's armchair supporters, slashing the cost of its sports channels for satellite and Freeview customers as it starts to screen Premiership matches.
Setanta's move is an attempt to score a goal before bitter rival BSkyB has even got its boots laced up. Freeview subscribers with the right sort of decoder will be able to access the 46 live Premier League matches that Setanta has to itself for £9.99 a month, without needing to sign up for an annual contract. Satellite users - whether or not they have a Sky subscription - will be offered eight Setanta channels for £9.99, down from £15.99.
Setanta's games, kicking off on August 11th, include matches played by the top four clubs and represent the first time that Freeview users have been able to watch live Premier League action. The first 19 matches screened include Aston Villa taking on Liverpool, with Fernando Torres making his Premier League debut, and Spurs' 125th anniversary celebration game on October 1st.
Sky's own plans to get football onto a pay-TV service on Freeview, meanwhile, were kicked into touch by the British media and telecoms regulator last month.
Ofcom's decision to launch a public inquiry into Sky's plans for three pay-TV channels on the digital terrestrial TV (DTT) platform - which were expected to include football coverage - has delayed the satellite broadcaster's launch until at least next year. As a result, Setanta has the 11m Freeview households in Britain to itself for the start of the season.
The new pricing plans follow Setanta's swoop on high-profile presenters with Blackburn Rovers and Spurs captain Tim Sherwood lured from Sky to sit alongside his former team-mate Les Ferdinand as well as Steve McManaman and anchorman Angus Scott.
Setanta will also be available through BT's Vision platform, along with some matches which BT has bought. Setanta is also on Virgin Media though prices have yet to be finalised.
Setanta was originally blindsided by Sky's Freeview move, but has remained confident throughout it can boost its subscriber figures five-fold to about one million by the beginning of the 2008-09 season. At that point its deal to show FA Cup and England matches will kick in.
Some in the City, however, are openly speculating about whether Setanta will generate enough interest to keep its venture capital investors happy. It won't be easy - the list of those who have taken on Sky and won is short.
Setanta has been keen to paint its run of sports rights deals as the equivalent of classic FA Cup giant killings. Following the headline-grabbing £392 million swoop for 46 live Premier League games a season, it made a £9 million bid for the rights to US golf coverage, and pulled off the dramatic snatch of FA Cup and England games from the BBC and Sky, in partnership with ITV.
Appearing alongside ITV chairman Michael Grade and FA chief Brian Barwick - two men trying to revive fading national institutions - Setanta director of sport Trevor East was clear about its place in the pecking order.
"We are regarded as new kids on the block. But this will make us a very attractive alternative or addition to Sky in the sports TV market. We'll have more live football than any other UK broadcaster once this deal starts," he said, referring to its coverage of the Nationwide Conference, Scottish Premier League and other European leagues.
Joint chief executive Michael O'Rourke agrees. "Before, you might have been able to argue that you could take or leave it. But as a serious football fan it would now be hard to say you don't want Setanta." That stance is a subtle shift from Setanta's line when it won its slice of the Premiership rights, positioning itself as a possible alternative to Sky Sports rather than an add-on.
But amid the romance of Setanta's rise to prominence, its FA Cup bid raised the volume of chatter in the City about its ability to make the gamble pay. At a time of upheaval in the pay TV market, analysts have been wondering whether it can make its numbers add up.
The £425 million secured for the FA by Barwick, a former BBC and ITV sports chief, was a 42 per cent improvement on the previous deal, while the Premier League broke all records by bringing in a total of £2.7 billion in its latest round of contracts. Some are now openly speculating that the rights market is close to overheating again, as happened in the years after the dotcom crash.
The big question is whether there is a rump of sports fans who find Sky too expensive and who would be content with digital channels via Freeview or satellite, plus the add-on of Setanta Sport.
Fans can subscribe to Sky Sports 1 and 3 for £34 a month. Viewers would then have to pay extra £9.99 for Setanta, either on satellite or through a Freeview box. So, for those who must have all top-flight football and golf, it will cost at least £43.99.
There is a lingering suspicion that while Setanta may have secured a range of attractive rights, it is lacking the exclusivity that attracts new subscribers. Sky still has the pick of the Premier League action, the best time slots and the biggest matches.
Insiders say Sky, meanwhile, decided a long time ago that England games and the FA Cup didn't drive subscriptions. While it still dug deep to secure the rights to 92 Premier League games a season, paying £1.31 billion over three years, they also point to the breadth of Sky's appeal. "Sky Sports is about more than football and Sky is about more than Sky Sports," says one.
But East, the former number two at Sky Sports, is universally regarded as a canny operator and Setanta executives insist they have secured the rights they want for less than they expected to pay.
Over at Sky's Osterley headquarters, meanwhile, the broadcaster that has changed the face of football is limbering up for a scrap. For O'Rourke, it can't come soon enough.
Guardian Service
