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Keeping control

Premier League retains TV deal rights for clubs

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Posted: Wednesday July 28, 1999 12:29 PM

LONDON (AP) - The Premier League, governing body of England's top flight soccer competition, won a court case Wednesday to confirm its right to negotiate television rights on behalf of all 20 league clubs.

The British Government's Office of Fair Trading accused the Premier League of acting like a "cartel" by controlling television rights for the competition instead of allowing individual clubs to make independent deals.

The Office of Fair Trading alleged that the deal restricted freedom of choice of fans and was against the public interest.

But a judge in the Restrictive Practices Court on Wednesday ruled in favor of the Premier League's right to negotiate centrally.

The Premier League has a four-year deal with BSkyB, worth 743 million pounds (US$1.2 billion), which expires in 2001. Money from the TV deal is distributed to clubs by the league.

The Premier League said it was protecting smaller clubs by negotiating TV deals rather than allowing a cut-throat approach that would create a small group of wealthy teams at the expense of others.

The Premier League's existing contracts with satellite broadcaster BSkyB and the BBC remained valid.

The OFT opened an investigation into the Premier League in 1995, reportedly in response to complaints from rival satellite TV providers unhappy with BSkyB's monopoly on English soccer coverage.

 

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