Like a lot of things in the entertainment industry when it comes to new technology, it's a losing battle.

Everyone I know finds a way to see the 3pm games. Whether that's in pubs or through illegal streams. It's ripe for monetising but it's understandable they'd have to trend carefully because of their current agreements with Sky and BT. Hopefully soon enough there'll be some kind of breakthrough.

But the US is dramatically bigger than the UK for a start. They don't have people travelling to away games like we do for football matches. They base local TV coverage on a % of ticket sales a few days before the game... If it hasn't achieved the target then it suffers a local blackout but the UK is just too small for that to work.

If drip feeding their product to domestic broadcasters and earning over £3billion for a 3-year deal is living in the dark ages then I'm sure they're pretty happy with that label!

Sure, I'm just pointing out that that legal services can be successful.

I don't subscribe to sky sports as I really don't want to just watch Man United and Liverpool every week. I would however pay the equivalent money to watch every game for my own team.

I had a season ticket for 8 years running and went to plenty of away games but now I have kids and I can't spend entire Saturday's travelling anymore.

I simply want to watch my team, legally.

Should the FA/PL allow Sky/BT to show all games, expect the cost of the service to double.

I don`t think it would be double the price but i for one would be happy to pay more but as we all know where not given the choice unlike the Dutch and Germans

I understand that and fully sympathise too but unfortunately it's not going to change. It's taken from 1992 to the present day for them to increase the live matches from 60 to 154 in the UK so we're still a long way away from 380 being offered.

The UK broadcasters will always angle more toward Man Utd and Liverpool because they're by far the biggest draws in terms of ratings. A club like Man City has the riches to compete now but they're still relatively small fry in terms of those other 2 clubs... Chelsea and Arsenal rank higher than them on the scale.

From the PL's perspective, would offering all 380 matches bring in an excessive amount of money? I don't think it would. Sky and BT currently pay excessive amounts to fight it out for the biggest matches involving the biggest teams - it's all about who owns the 1st and 2nd picks first and foremost. If it came down to 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th and 10th picks, the value to the broadcaster would also fall because who would realistically pay a large sum to show the 10th pick match when somebody else is showing the 1st - 4th picks on the same weekend?

Subscriptions have levelled out anyway so people wanting to see either Premier League or the Championship already subscribe - offering the 3pm's would have minimal impact. The current set-up works well for both broadcasters and the league.

Also keep in mind that it's not the PL who enforce the 3pm closed window period - it's the FA. I for one enjoy going to the odd Saturday 3pm match when we're not picked for TV and wouldn't fancy everything being moved to Sunday afternoon every week.

I agree - I don't think it would double the price either because the quality of the 3pm's is low compared to the matches available in the current packages.

The Germans have the best model - they show all matches live on Sky but to keep stadiums full, they keep ticket prices low. At the same time though, they only earn around £500m a season from domestic TV money - that's for all the matches. Compare that to the Premier League domestic income from BT at £738m (for 38 matches!) over 3 years and £2.28bn from Sky for just 116 matches and there really is no comparison in business terms - the Premier League is head and shoulders above the rest.

Obviously the PL don't officially announce international deals but it's believed that extra income totals an extra £2-3bn - compare that with Bundesliga international broadcast money of only £55m a season or thereabouts.

Just got a NBCSports sub i did a swap for a netflix login.
I see what people mean the quality is stunning.

Seems like PLP have banned a small number of people, but not others.
It's a smart move. They demonstrate to the PL that they're "clampling down" on us but at the same time, some new subscribers might still take the risk to subscribe because others haven't been banned.
To those complaining about being banned, it's unfortunate, but we (should) all go into this with open eyes. We're breaking the terms of service of all there streaming providers and therefore risk suspension of our accounts.
Last year I managed to get through the whole season without any problems. Perhaps that won't be the case this year, but it's worth the "risk" for me to try.

Its too small for that to work ? how did you come to that conclusion ?
The %of ticket sales is only for NFL, for MLB, NBA and NHL the games are televised regardless of ticket sales.
Even if the EPL followed the NFL model, the fans will continue to go to games, they wont risk not going and have the game be blacked out, so the problem solves itself.
Even if it is the case that some games may not reach the required attendance to be televised, we`d still see vastly more games than we get now.

Mark Judd you say eventually, it lasted one weekend lol. I only signed up last friday.

ALso regarding the saturday 3pm I think you have under estimated how much demand there is. In real life (not the internet) I know 20 odd people alone that wont pay for sky not because of price, but because it only shows the big teams. But they would pay sky prices to watch their own team every week. I am in that group of people as well.

The solution seems simple, move all the EPL games to sunday 3pm, then its outside of the TV block window. All the games dont need to be on main tv channels, they can put the 3-10th choice on red button, internet only, people be fine with that.

what happens if both sky and BT say we will pay 3 billion for all games take it or leave it?

If they moved all of the games to 3pm on Sunday they would change the tv blackout to 3pm on a Sunday

Good for you. Now you're sorted. Stunning but you should have seen ESPN'S world cup live steaming quality. Beats NBC by a mile. Even PLP.. How I wish ESPN had the premier league rights in the US. They have in Latin Americ though.

I always thought a main single game on the Saturday evening, then one on Sunday around 1pm, then people can choose to watch whatever games from 3pm on Sunday, then maybe another Sunday game at 7pm, and a Monday night football game.

I heard ESPN was amazing, i have ESPN too as the deal i got included a lot of channels too.

http://www.en.beinsports.net/footbal...on-bein-sports

Beinsports just announced that they will show the Bundesliga now too, which was the only league missing to their package.

I can say that even if they are not showing the EPL for the time being, Beinsports is still well worth the money that it costs, especially now that they have got german football games too.

Is ESPN available online

you have to have a cable or satellite package linked to it

Thats good news, I hardly use my bein sports account that I bought for £50 for a year, only use it for champions league and la liga

as I understand it, its because of the FL clubs outside of the EPL, the EPL clubs themselves arent the issue. The 80 million or so each club gets per season is already ample compensation.

Who knows but the only reason i can think of apart from the BS about fans going to the games is tv rights and making more money from them but i maybe wrong the PL are not exactly forthcoming when it comes to there real intentions

What's the resolution, bitrate and framerate?

Can you pm me with your NBC sports contact and price etc

Cheers

Any chance of pm over your contact for NBC