Sky pours more pounds into footballers pockets >From http://dofonline.co.uk
Poor Lord Leveson and his endless inquiry think that BSkyBs future is entwined with politics. No; its about football, as the GBP3bn paid for the latest premiership television rights show. Sky is paying GBP6.5m a match for the next three seasons. Compare that with the GBP1m gatemoney that the biggest clubs can collect (and share) at a top match if they are lucky. And compare it with the GBP25m annual loss of running Sky News, the 24- hour channel BSkyB subsidises to appease politicians and which is the only reason why Rupert Murdoch was prevented from taking full control of the television station he created. That loss is four matches in football money. Skys GBP2.3bn share of the Premiership football rights (BT is paying the other GBP738m in another expensive attempt to chase customers) is one third of the companys annual turnover or twice its operating profit. Football remains massive money, but if Sky is managed in a cannily commercially manner, the recipients of this cache of cash will fritter it away in the most unbusinesslike way. The football clubs area already awash with inflows of cash. The Sky/BT money is not their only windfall. There could be another GBP2bn from selling international TV rights and there is Barclays sponsorship for the League and individual sponsorships for the clubs. Then there are Cup matches and Europe. Plus selling shirts and the like. And even those gate receipts. Yet for many clubs that is not enough and they borrow recklessly or rely on vanity owners to inject massive capital sums. And where does it go? On players who receive wages that the chief executives of BSkyB or BT could only dream of but are still criticised for receiving. We know that the finances of football are the accounting of the asylum but in a free market, how people waste their money is their own business. However, if anyone is to call a halt to this escalation it has to be the television stations or the subscribers who give them the money. No wonder Murdoch wanted to buy Sky, but even poor Leveson must now realise that his inquiry has been asking the wrong people the wrong questions all these months. Its about football, not politics. ------------------------------------------------ This message was sent using InSPire Net Webmail. http://www.inspire.net.nz
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