SPFL must get the rights level of cash from next TV deal
“If you go to an auction, the price is obviously going to be lower if there’s only one bidder. You have to at least offer an alternative rather than just taking the only offer on the table.
“We’ve got to try to compete. In the past we were too quick to take the pieces of silver. I feel like we are stumbling towards this other deal as if it were a fait accompli and we have no other option.”
Wise words this week given Scottish football is again sitting round the table trying to negotiate a new television deal.
Except these words were not from this week. They are in fact from 2009.
It’s not often we go to the big book of Sir David Murray quotes, unless it’s for a line to use to highlight the excesses of the old Ibrox regime that led the club down the painful path to ruin.
But we should heed Murray’s warning a decade on as the SPFL find themselves yet again over a barrel when it comes to broadcasting.
Back in 2009 it was the begging bowl our clubs had out after Setanta went belly up.
We had to go back to Sky with out tails between our legs and we ended up going from lunch at the Ritz to a Barlinnie breakfast.
It turns out Setanta’s £125m over four years in 2008 was too good to be true. Just 12 months later the broadcaster went bust and we were handcuffed into a deal with Sky and ESPN worth just £65m across five cold years.
It’s no coincidence our game ended up in the grubber.
Yet here we are again. Months ago the SPFL felt quite chipper. The rights were up for renewal for 2020 onwards and this time there would be a bun fight to grab our gloriously bonkers game. Sky, BT Sport, Eleven Sports, Amazon, Netfix, Blockbuster Video, you name it, they were all going to be in the Hampden car park, stripped to the waist, ready to scrap it out for an ongoing series with so much drama it makes Game of Thrones look like Sesame Street. So much for that thinking. BT Sport’s overreach into the Champions League has pulled the rug out of their coverage of just about anything else.
The other lot have gone dark and yet again it’s Sky who are left at the table with a big grin and a bag of money that looks suspiciously lighter than we hoped. The £100m over three years might sound like a lot. If it goes through it will probably be hailed by Neil Doncaster as “The Greatest Deal in Scottish Football History”.
But hang on. That is £ 33m a season, and in today ’ s money, Setanta offered £ 40m.
Even £ 40m is a steal when you look at the numbers watching and the cash coming in for other leagues throughout Europe.
It wasn’t so long ago BT agreed a £50m-a-year deal for English rugby, which gets similar viewing figures to our games.
BT pulling the plug on us would be a major kick in the stones but the SPFL are going up against Sky’s royal flush with a pair of twos in their hand.
Doncaster and the clubs have to hold firm though. Don’t take the first and last offer on the table. Get out and bang on doors, drum up interest.
Remember Murray’s warning from 2009. Because those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.