An alliance of television providers KPN, VodafoneZiggo, T-Mobile and Delta has outbid sports channel ESPN to get hold of the premier league rights. De Telegraaf and VI report this. The offer from the cable companies to broadcast matches live would yield the Eredivisie clubs more than 200 million euros annually. Over a contract period of ten years (2025-2035), an amount of more than 2 billion euros could be distributed.
The companies would have submitted their offer yesterday to director Eredivisie CV Jan de Jong and the media committee of the premier league clubs. They will consider the offer. According to both media, the costs for the clubs have already been deducted from the amount that is now being offered.
According to De Telegraaf, the cable companies have promised Jan de Jong to keep premier league football affordable and to make it widely available.
ESPN bid was already significantly higher
The final offer of the television providers that both media are now writing about is considerably higher than that of the American ESPN, the current rights holder. That company had already made an offer of more than one and a half billion euros for the same period. Although lower than the bid from the cable companies, that is already a huge difference with the 1 billion euros that Fox Sports (now ESPN) put down for the rights in 2012.
De Telegraaf writes that collecting the premier league rights seemed to be a race for ESPN. Although the newspaper reported last week that the TV providers had made a proposal to make football more widely available via television, premier league clubs wanted clarity about an amount as soon as possible, and that was not yet there. The intention would have been to vote on the ESPN bid on May 8.
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