Premiership overseas plan 'could net £240m'

Arsenal v Manchester City - Premier League
Premier League: some matches could be held abroad under today's plans. Photograph: Getty

The Premier League could make up to £240m in extra revenue from selling TV and match hosting rights if plans to introduce 10 overseas games to the existing season are approved.

Today's plan would see overseas cities bid for the rights to host the 10 extra games, which would count as normal Premier League fixtures with three points for a win, although the top five teams are likely to be seeded so they do not play each other.

The Premier League would also be able to seek extra from selling TV rights to UK and overseas broadcasters for the extra games.

Senior sources in broadcasting estimate that the Premier League could make anywhere between £140m and £240m from the extra matches in its next three-year rights deal. This does not include potentially significant revenues from ticket and merchandising sales.

Under the current TV rights deal, which runs until 2010, the Premier League sold the UK TV rights for £1.7bn and international rights for £625m.

The average cost for live coverage per match in the UK is £4.1m. BSkyB on average pays £4.7m to air each of its 92 games and Setanta £2.8m for its 46.

So the Premier League could expect to make around £125m from the domestic TV rights to the foreign matches in its next three-year deal.

A bidding war among cities for the potentially hugely attractive matches - especially in the growing Asian market - could net the Premier League anywhere from £30m to £60m for the hosting rights for the 30 matches over the course of the next three-year deal.

Similarly the overseas TV rights to the new matches could also net the Premier League anywhere from £30m to £60m.

However, one senior broadcasting executive argued that the value per match aired in the UK will be much less than the £4.1m average.

The TV insider suggested perhaps just £1m or £2m per game - some £30m to £60m across the next three-year deal - because the 10 new matches will be played across one weekend.

"Because all the games are over one two-day period you can't build an effective subscriber base and it isn't as simple as to say that an increase in games aired equals an equivalent increase in value," said the source. "And also who else might look to bid for the new games, probably not a new player?"

Broadcasting sources said they believed there are potential issues with the times that games will air in the UK.

The proposed overseas fixtures will also not include top five clashes, which attract the biggest audiences for matches between the likes of Manchester United and Chelsea, meaning the price per game will not be at the top end.

Another factor that might limit the extra revenue generated from the extra overseas fixtures is the large number of Premier League games already broadcast live in other countries.

The overseas TV rights package includes 171 live games per season, while in the UK there are 138 matches televised live.

"The overseas rights for these matches are of the greatest interest to whichever cities host them of course," said one senior executive at a broadcaster. "But with so many games shown internationally already, how much more would another few matches really be worth to a foreign broadcaster."

However, there are predictions that the explosion of interest in markets such as Asia could see the cost of the international TV rights boosted by 15% from £625m to £720m by the time the next deal is negotiated in 2009.



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