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The long-standing television blackout of 3pm Saturday games is facing increasing pressure as Premier League owners strive to grow revenues further.
The present rule is that no football matches can be broadcast live domestically in the UK on television between 2.45pm and 5.15pm on a Saturday. That includes matches from abroad, such as Serie A and La Liga.
Mail Sport revealed there are a growing number of Premier League clubs who want to scrap the blackout from the 2029 domestic TV rights cycle, which they believe would increase broadcast revenue.
Mail Sport’s IAN HERBERT and NICK HARRIS debate whether the blackout should be protected.
A growing number of Premier League clubs are in favour of scrapping the 3pm blackout
Yes – Ian Herbert
It’s unfashionable these days to discuss the communion of sport — the simple act of gathering with strangers to share the agonies and ecstasies of following a football team. The notion of there being a sacrosanct time for this, protected from the sound and fury of the Premier League, is apparently out of date.
Those who argue for an abandonment of the 3pm blackout point to the numbers. But behind the data is the bleak reality that the Premier League juggernaut materialising at the protected time will whittle away the appeal of the lower league clubs.
Those with an instinctive feel for football beyond the Premier League — a global division with owners looking to sweat every last dime of profit — will see the signs. Supporters in the stands are generally of a more mature age, many of them introduced to the religion by a parent or grandparent. It’s a battle to attract the young in the face of the vast number of competing distractions.
In an exhibition entitled Going to the Match, running at Bolton Museum, a photograph captures fans waiting to enter the old Burnden Park. The queue is of a length that would provoke complaint today but no one seems bothered. The supporters stand in earnest conversation, wrapped against the cold. It is almost certainly a little before 3pm on a Saturday. That kind of communion is becoming scarcer and a means of maintaining it seems to be slipping away. More’s the pity.
Scrapping the blackout will slowly whittle away the appeal of the lower league clubs
No – Nick Harris
Attendances in the Premier League and Football League have been at all-time record highs in recent seasons, at a time when there has never been more live football on TV. This undermines the argument that if you screen even more PL football, then supporters of clubs outside the top flight will stop going to watch their own teams.
As Sky, BT Sport (now TNT Sports) and other broadcasters have made massive efforts to sell their PL product since 1992-93, so the league has become a national obsession.
There has never been more newspaper, radio and internet coverage. Even the transfer window is now covered almost hysterically by all outlets — because there’s an audience for it. All of which adds up to demands for tickets, a rise in live attendances, and an amplification of popularity.
The notion that a Newcastle versus Bournemouth TV match at 3pm on a Saturday will encourage a fan of, say, Barnsley or Cardiff to stay at home and watch that instead of their own team is highly arguable.
The idea that Manchester United v Liverpool in a televised 3pm Saturday kick-off would encourage them is more risible still: all the biggest fixtures are already in marquee slots elsewhere over the weekend. Some Bournemouth fans might stay at home and watch the Newcastle game rather than make a 700-mile round trip. But match-going fans, not least those who travel away, are the most hardcore of supporters.
Attendances are at an all-time high despite more live football being on television than ever
