The Daily Mail is reporting the Rupert Murdoch’s Sky Sports has won the rights to four of the six “live game packages” after outbidding the competition for the 1.7 Billion Pound valued Premiership Television rights and surpassing their prior 1.314 Billion Pound payment for the current deal.

Via DailyMail

The other two sets of 23 matches, currently being broadcast by Setanta, have been kept back for a second round of bidding that can start at 3pm tomorrow.

The fact that Sky have retained their Premier League portfolio in the first round of the tender process points to the satellite station having offered at least the £1.314billion that gained them the four packages of their current agreement.

At the last auction for domestic live rights held in April 2006, the Premier League kept back their plum Package A – the 23 first-pick games to be shown on Sunday at 4pm – to squeeze nearly £7m-a-game for the showcase matches from Sky in the second auction, having awarded the network three packages from their initial bids.
Sky, buoyed by their recent announcement of half-year operating profits up 31 per cent to £385m, must have impressed the Premier League with their opening offer to secure all four rights.

As well as their Sunday flagship Package A, Sky have retained Package B, 23 games to be shown on Sundays at 1.30pm; Package E, 23 games for 12.45pm on Saturday; and Package F, 23 matches at various kick-off times.
This leaves Setanta’s offerings of Monday 8pm games and Saturday 5.15pm slots open for the second tender.
The delayed decision means an agonising further wait for the subscription network, who have made it clear how much they need to retain their two Premier League packages to stay in business.
It also suggests that the Walt Disney-owned channel ESPN, whose strategy has remained a mystery throughout the tender process, have made some sort of bid and the Premier League are giving them another opportunity to show how serious they are about showing live football from England’s elite division.

And there is major optimism within Gloucester Place that the overseas market will deliver a big percentage rise on the £650m that the foreign territories produced last time.
When all the other rights for delayed coverage, broadband, mobile phone and other new technology are gathered in, the Premier League might break the £3bn figure – an extraordinary achievement in the current economic climate.

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