Sky Sports asked how many paid £14.95 PPV for Newcastle United 1 Manchester United 4
Sky Sports launched their brave new world of charging £14.95 for Pay Per View matches in the Premier League.
Rather than being just a generous gesture, as Sky Sports (and BT Sport and the Premier League) claim, to allow fans to be able to watch every match whilst fans are banned from stadiums.
Many fans seeing this as simply the thin end of the wedge.
Sky Sports kicked off their Premier League PPV schedule of nine October matches with Newcastle United 1 Manchester United 4 on Saturday night, then Leicester 0 Villa 1 on Sunday night.
Meanwhile, BT Sport have six PPV PL matches in October and they started this weekend with Chelsea 3 Southampton 3 and Sheffield United 1 Fulham 1.
Supporters believing that far from being a service to fans, the likes of Sky Sports seeing this as a chance to gauge how many people would be prepared to pay the extortionate £14.95, in order to see how this could then benefit them on a wider scale in the future, with ever increasing matches on PPV.
Well, Sky Sports have been asked the question.
The broadcaster asked how many people paid the £14.95 t0 watch Newcastle United 1 Manchester United 4 and Leicester 0 Villa 1.
John Sinnott of CNN revealing on Twitter:
I asked Sky how many people bought Premier League ppv games over the weekend.
The response: “We won’t be sharing the PPV numbers as they are commercially sensitive.”
Hmmm.
I think we can be pretty sure of one thing, if it had been good news for Sky Sports they would 100% have been sharing it as widely as possible, particularly as an encouragement to fans of the 20 clubs to watch the other upcoming PPV matches.
Instead, I think these replies to the CNN man’s Twitter message very much sum up what the truth is…
‘Commercially sensitive and publicly embarrassing!’
‘Good question but in what sense are they commercially sensitive given this is supposedly just a short term measure?
Given the broadcaster is supposed to be just covering their costs how is there any commercial detriment or benefit whatever the number?’
‘It’s not is it? No one else is bidding for it, they’re exclusive, but they just happen to be charging for it. That’s the only commercial aspect to it.’
‘Translation: Numbers lower than they expected.’
‘So I take it it was bad news.’
‘If the number was huge .. sure as hell they would be sharing as a commercial ploy to attract further subscribers for PPV games.’
‘We can only deduce that the number is embarrassingly low.’
‘They usually share the numbers for boxing PPV!’
‘So…not many then.’
‘Tell them you want to buy an advertising slot and want an idea of how many viewers you could reach.’
‘Basically we sold f.ck all, n were too embarrassed to tell people what a f.ck up we made of it.’
In a poll on The Mag, it wasn’t having to pay an extra fee to watch these extra live televised PL matches that was the problem for most, only 26% thought that the extra games should be totally free.
Most people accepted that an extra fee was justified BUT not the extortionate £14.95 price, not a single person of the thousands polled thought £12.99, £14.95 of more than £14.95 was a fair price.
Instead, 41% thought £4.99 would have been fair, 10% with £2.99, 14% going for £7.99 and 9% with £9.99.
Fans won’t be allowed into stadiums for some time, so very interesting to see what the Premier League and broadcasters announce when the November live TV schedule is released.
Will they blindly push on with this ridiculous (both commercially and morally) high level of charging, which clearly hasn’t worked and isn’t going to. Or will they accept commercial (and moral?) reality and change to a fair price?
The announcement of PPV games in original Premier League Official Announcement:
Further to the Premier League’s announcement that all fixtures until the end of October will continue to be made available for fans to watch live in the United Kingdom, the revised schedule for all matches up to and including 2 November has been released.
All times below are BST until Saturday 24 October and GMT from Sunday 25 October.
Matchweek 5
Saturday 17 October
12:30 Everton v Liverpool (BT Sport)
15:00 Chelsea v Southampton (BT Sport Box Office)
17:30 Man City v Arsenal (Sky Sports)
20:00 Newcastle v Man Utd (Sky Sports Box Office)
Sunday 18 October
12:00 Sheffield Utd v Fulham (BT Sport Box Office)
14:00 Crystal Palace v Brighton (Sky Sports)
16:30 Spurs v West Ham (Sky Sports)
19:15 Leicester City v Aston Villa (Sky Sports Box Office)
Monday 19 October
17:30 West Brom v Burnley (Sky Sports Box Office)
20:00 Leeds v Wolves (Sky Sports)
Matchweek 6
Friday 23 October
20:00 Aston Villa v Leeds Utd (BT Sport Box Office)
Saturday 24 October
12:30 West Ham v Man City (BT Sport)
15:00 Fulham v Crystal Palace (BT Sport Box Office)
17:30 Man Utd v Chelsea (Sky Sports)
20:00 Liverpool v Sheff Utd (Sky Sports Box Office)
Sunday 25 October
14:00 Southampton v Everton (Sky Sports)
16:30 Wolves v Newcastle (Sky Sports)
19:15 Arsenal v Leicester City (Sky Sports Box Office)
Monday 26 October
17:30 Brighton v West Brom (Sky Sports Box Office)
20:00 Burnley v Spurs (Sky Sports)
Matchweek 7
Friday 30 October
20:00 Wolves v Crystal Palace (BT Sport Box Office)
Saturday 31 October
12:30 Sheff Utd v Man City (BT Sport)
15:00 Burnley v Chelsea (BT Sport Box Office)
17:30 Liverpool v West Ham (Sky Sports)
Sunday 1 November
12:00 Aston Villa v Southampton (Sky Sports Box Office)
14:00 Newcastle v Everton (Sky Sports)
16:30 Man Utd v Arsenal (Sky Sports)
19:15 Spurs v Brighton (Sky Sports Box Office)
Monday 2 November
17:30 Fulham v West Brom (Sky Sports Box Office)
20:00 Leeds v Leicester (Sky Sports)
Confirmation of the final kick-off times for matches in November and December impacted upon by UEFA Europa League participation will be issued when the broadcast selections for the relevant month are announced.
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