New EFL Broadcast Deal
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/65502322
Looks good for increased income, however many more matches are likely to be moved from 3pm each week.
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https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/65502322
Looks good for increased income, however many more matches are likely to be moved from 3pm each week.
Comments
248 League One matches on TV. Each match involves 2 teams, so on average around 20 WWFC matches will be televised.
This means some games on a Friday night, some at 12:30 or 5:30 on a Saturday, and some on a Sunday. I hated this when BT Sport called the scheduling shots for rugby, and will hate it just as much with Sky dictating what time we play.
Baffles me that the blackout still exists - they're quite happy to lift it tomorrow
If they choose games by interest and size of club as they do in the Championship I expect we will see between 5-10 games broadcast.
Here is this seasons Championship coverage
This starts the season after next and will make going to away games even more difficult for the average fan who wishes to travel by train.
This isn't going to help with attendances
The ironic thing is that the blackout is in place to preserve attendances at games, however by moving the kick-off times there will be at least an equal impact.
Absolutely awful for so many reasons but mainly more money but for everyone will lead to more debt more clubs living on the edge. The further erosion of traditional Saturdays football. Crap crowds with Sunday night games. Getting to Carlisle for a midday fixture. Sky are the enemy of football.
No wonder Rob Couhig made his move to secure further ownership of the club when he did, knowing that this additional windfall of tv rights money was just days away.
I totally disagree, and not just because I used to work for Sky. Like millions of other viewers, I have been able to enjoy watching some wonderfully entertaining games this season for a fraction of what it would have cost to attend them in person. This deal will provide EFL clubs with much needed and guaranteed income and there is no evidence whatsoever that televised football has led to a decline in attendances, quite the opposite in fact. Also, your criticism of Sky is misguided as this deal was approved-unanimously-by all 72 EFL clubs. Where else could they generate the vast sums that Sky will pay?
You say what you want bud. Sky is the enemy to me and thousands more. Why do we need to pump even more money into clubs? Surely the way forward is capping to stop debt and poor ownership.
I guess all that depends on shape of the funnel of distribution. If it’s 70/20/10 then the trap door just gets harder to open.
Well, to do that you would need the agreement of every club and the bigger and wealthier clubs will never accept it, which is why the even distribution of the Sky money in each division represents a good deal for smaller clubs like Wycombe.
Time will tell how attractive we are for the league 1 game selections. (If we did slink up to the champs we'd guarantee rock bottom amounts of games!).
Sometimes a non 3pm Sat game actually suits, but much more likely it'll be a real hassle having to try and get to a Friday night or Sunday game.
This deal is about getting more "fans" watching football on telly.
WW should be endeavouring to get fans in Adams Park.
As I have I have posted many times before Wycombe have lost at least one generation of fans, via the complete
disconnect with the closing down of the community scheme.
My opinion is there are 2 types of fans, TV fans :- generally watch a game but have limited emotional engagement, and more likely to "support" more than one team. The match day is 90 minutes (plus our time wasting bastards bonus)
4D fans, where there is a big green thing in front of you. Emotional engagement is often worryingly high, (my evening is often ruined by a Cheltenham/Morecambe level performance), more likely to only support one team, match day is a minimum 2 hours, mine is generally 5 hours minimum for a home game and up to 3 days for an away game.
Attendances are poor, atmosphere is not good enough, I saw an article earlier in the week regarding the decline of "the village" performances have been uninspiring. All of these and more are interwoven and need to be addressed to allow Chairboys to make a challenge for the playoffs next season.
I see ticket prices are rising (understandable but disappointing) season tickets are being pushed, having renewed mine it was a challenge due to poor website and someone to talk too.
Communication and engagement are the way forward. One of the major plusses in the early Couhig days was their communication, engagement and enthusiasm. For me this has waned in each area over this season, admittedly understandable after the disappointment of Wembley. I cannot see how this TV deal will help WW, proportionally the bigger clubs will benefit by more ££s, players wages will rise to swallow up any increase in budget, but I fear the level of player may not.
Rant over for now.
Have a good break and see you in August. COYC.
More money to all clubs with no limits on what they do with it will push up fees and wages and the same number will go bust but you can't blame Sky, the chairmen aren't six years old, if they gamble on even more through promotion or staying up they bare the blame. I liked to think we weren't that type of club and trust ownership even as a minority shareholder would help us stay that way but the last few years do seem to suggest otherwise.
Remember when the football league clubs all voted to hand over their best young talent to premier league clubs for peanuts? Remember when half the country voted to throw our economy down the shitter for decades to come because a funny man with scruffy hair told them to?
I can see the attraction for the clubs but too much fiddling about with the fixtures will certainly put my subs at risk...as I work until late on most weekdays so Tuesday nights and midweek Cup games already cause me bother (as I cannot stream either). Regular Monday or Friday games would be tricky for me to attend or justify paying just to be counted in the attendances.
With all weekday and bank holiday games being screened live, I presume that means the death of the £10 club Iplayer thingy. Also means that around 1 in 5 weekend games will not kick off at 3pm on a Saturday.
Lots of money but in danger of further destroying the habit of watching football on a Saturday that locks supporters in.
That’ll be the end of my season ticket then. Sky dicking about with KO times in return for cash. Great for player wages, not so good for the attending public.
Once upon a time I’d have welcomed more Wycombe games on tv, but since iFollow / WWTV started showing every game I’d much rather watch on there. Phil plus one other’s commentary is vastly preferable, even if the technical camera stuff is more limited. Plus you don’t have to see bitter old Jamie Mackie.
People saying this won't affect attendances... it absolutely will
Hard to see how they could fit in that many games at weekends if shown separately especially with premier games taking precedence.
have to assume there will be several games streamed simultaneously - maybe 1230 starts.
Midweek games are difficult for me (distance/age) so I’ll see how it pans out perhaps the club could offer a combined season ticket for weekend game’s attendance with a streaming pass for weekdays.
Get rid of the blackout, televise all games, and you wouldn't have to move nearly as many kick-offs. It's unbelievably archaic.
Presumably if the EFL find this harms attendances and total revenues then they just won't renew the broadcast deal after the 5 yr contract ends?
I honestly don't know what the outcome will be. As someone noted above, increased TV coverage has actually coincided with rising crowds. That might be because the increased exposure attracts new punters. Although it is hard to determine cause and effect there. Maybe crowds went up for other reasons and that made the game appear more attractive as a broadcast product.
There are also lots of other factors at play which have improved crowds - better pitches and facilities, less anti-social behaviour and so on - so it is hard to know what the main driver is. But it seems reasonable to argue TV hasn't severely harmed live attendances.
More TV coverage enhances the upside of having some charismatic players/staff and playing exciting football. Clearly those things are important anyway, but you'll see more clips like Bayo's Wembley interview going round on social media as Sky's coverage broadens. In turn, that will help attract new young supporters if we can feature in said clips. From a marketing and promotional point of view we ought to be thinking about how we maximise this to our advantage. If we're an attractive broadcast proposition then Sky acts as an agent to help market the club.
I'd even consider things like switching the camera position to the other side. Some kind of perch on the smaller stand would mean we have the newer, kid-friendly section of the stadium in shot. Of course we'd need to move the advertising boards around the other side of the pitch too (I imagine that investment in the electronic ad boards will pay dividends if we can get more TV coverage too).
..... says someone who rarely goes to games.
What about non league clubs who rely upon valuable revenue from fans of league clubs who will go along when their team is away? Sod 'em yeah?
Just imagine how many times Wrexham and Salford are going to be picked for coverage
Thank goodness at least one poster can see some of the positives in this deal. PL games are on TV almost every day of the week but it’s almost impossible to buy tickets for games despite eye watering prices. EFL attendances have risen across all three divisions including this season and they are the highest they have been for many years. For a club like Wycombe where income from gate receipts is one of the lowest in the division, this extra TV cash and the accompanying commercial opportunities will be a bonus.
I can see downsides as well. But I’m willing to keep on open mind and see how it pans out.
What I would like to see is some protection against moving KO times at short notice. There should be something like a mandatory minimum of 6 weeks advance notice before a games is moved from a 3pm KO.
I haven’t seen all the details of the contract but I’m fairly certain it includes a clause about selecting televised games several weeks or even months ahead.
Please talk us through how Wycombe getting more money helps us when everyone else is also getting more money and the wages teams richer than us are prepared to pay players is even more inflated?