The BBC bounced back from yesterday’s defeat in the bidding war for Premier League highlights when it secured the live rights to the FA Cup and England internationals. The right to broadcast the matches will be shared with BSkyB in a deal worth £440m.
The agreement was announced by the FA last night as the BBC was accused of sour grapes after it lost the right to broacast Premier League highlights to commercial broadcaster ITV (see The Game Isn’t Over Yet, Says Greg Dyke). Today’s news will save the corporation’s flagship football programme Match Of The Day.
Under the terms of the deal, Sky and the BBC will own the rights to broadcast the FA Cup and England international games for a three-year period from the beginning of the 2001-2 season to the end of 2003-4. All competitive international matches will be shown live on both the BBC and Sky Sports, while Sky will also broadcast friendly games live, with the highlights on the BBC.
The two broadcasters will share the live rights to FA Cup matches during cup rounds and both will broadcast live coverage of the final.
Commenting on the deal, Tony Ball, chief executive of BSkyB, said: “This is another endorsement for the quality of Sky’s live football coverage. I am delighted to be working with Greg Dyke in creating a partnership that will also bring top quality live football to the BBC.”
The BBC did not reveal how much it had paid to secure the rights but speculation that more than £70m was spent lead to accusations of hypocrisy after Greg Dyke had previously railed against the £61m yearly fee needed to secure the Premier League highlights.
BBC: 020 8743 8000 BSkyB: 020 7705 3000
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