Balderton’s Barry Maloney told the Daily Telegraph that “A football match that ends 5-1 does not suggest two evenly matched, equally competitive teams. The Premier League auction process has failed to introduce the fair competition that the European Commission intended. Sky’s market dominance has allowed it to bid a predatory price for football rights – a price based not on economics, but on its desire to damage its competition.”
Sources at BSkyB, which won a maximum five of the six packages on offer, told the paper that “Setanta’s private equity shareholders only have themselves to blame. They wanted a big price cut, they rolled the dice and they screwed up. You can call it reckless, but you can’t blame the process. We don’t treat the Premier League auction like a night out at the casino. We are long-term investors in quality content and we bid what the rights are worth. End of story.”
BSkyB and Setanta this week paid upfront deposits equalling three per cent of their total rights fee.