New EFL/Sky deal

248 League Two games is quite remarkable, especially considering the Saturday 3pm 'blackout' will be continuing.
Can only imagine this will cause a fair amount of fixtures to be move to Friday's, early and late Saturdays?

Also, i hate to be a sceptic, but are we assuming that this will mean a minimum of 46 Wrexham and the rest for the other 23?

More money for clubs = clubs just spend more do they not ?

We saw what can happen with ITV digital , doubtful it will ever happen with sky though;  but can't see how the clubs are ever going to reach 'sustainable ' level .

And we know know some clubs without a fallback will go s*it or bust with it +more and end up in a mess .

All midweeks, BH, the final game and adjusted KO times live on Sky then as it equates to 20 matchdays roughly. IFollow pretty much finished.

If the money is starting to trickle down from the billionaires then that’s good, but, is it enough? I hope the pot is evenly spread and just doesn’t focus on the likes of Wrexham, Salford and whichever club becomes the ‘de rigueur’ team of the moment. *





* am I going mad or was there a clothes shop called de rigueur in Grimsby years ago 🤷🏻‍♂️

I have a feeling that Wrexham (USA) of League 2 will become the Man Utd of the premier league as far as TV coverage is concerned, am I jealous no not in the slightest. We are Town UTM

Quoted from Mappers

More money for clubs = clubs just spend more do they not ?

We saw what can happen with ITV digital , doubtful it will ever happen with sky though;  but can't see how the clubs are ever going to reach 'sustainable ' level .

And we know know some clubs without a fallback will go s*it or bust with it +more and end up in a mess .

Realistically, yes. It just inflates financial expectations down the pyramid and merely exacerbates the kinds of problems we’ve seen lower league clubs suffer in recent years.

As good as this deal looks on paper, the reality is that a flattening out of club revenues thanks to a hefty TV deal accounting for the bulk of club incomes really plays in to the hands of bank rolled clubs as gate money becomes less relevant. The same reason that Bournemouth have been able to faulty consistently survive as a Premier League club ahead of tens of better supported clubs.

Good news on the surface, but probably better news in reality for the likes of Fleetwood, Forest Green and Salford than it is for this level’s more traditional clubs.

This was voted by the clubs btw.

Good Friday, Easter Monday, Boxing Day, New Years Day, first and last games is 72 of the 248 games to be shown. The original fixture list released last June had us playing 4 midweek games so that's another 48. 120 of the 248 games are already factored in which means an average of 3.5 games each week televised outside of that.

Do clubs get paid for their games being chosen? If so, I have an even bigger problem with the likely selection of Wrexham and Salford more often than not. Hopefully the selection of TV games is fair but it certainly starts to kick iFollow and it's alternatives into the long grass.

Clubs have unanimously approved the deal which is an increase but were they made aware of what others such as DAZN bid or just presented this offer?

Quoted Text

    Will matches still be available to watch via iFollow, or Clubs’ alternative streaming services?

    From the 2024/25 season onward, this new deal with Sky Sports will effectively replace the EFL’s domestic video streaming option provided via iFollow and club streaming services

    Audio services will remain alongside existing audio-visual arrangements for international audiences.

The EFL is effectively abandoning streaming in favour of traditional broadcasting for the time being then. This is probably a good thing in the short term but we'll have to figure out a way to embrace streaming at some point.