Amanda staveley sends premier league £6. 7bn warning amid 'big six' block threat

NEWCASTLE UNITED'S FORMER CO-OWNER AND DIRECTOR HAS SPOKEN OUT ON MEDIA RIGHTS WITHIN THE PREMIER LEAGUE 12:33, 21 May 2025 Amanda Staveley has spoken out on the concern over Premier

League media rights as clubs decide on whether to grant broadcasters behind-the-scenes access for the new season. The Premier League agreed a new record £6.7bn domestic television deal for

Sky and TNT to show up to 270 live games a season, which will come into force from this summer and which covers the four years from the 2025-26 season. However, when factoring in the fact it

is a four-year deal rather than the customary three years, on a seasonal basis it works out to £1.675bn a year, less than the £1.713bn a year in the 2015 agreement that covered the

2016-2019 seasons. Add in inflation and there appears to have been a drop in the value of the broadcast rights. The Premier League is not alone in this, with media rights declining in value

across all of Europe's top leagues. Former Newcastle United chief Staveley points to different consumption habits, particularly among young viewers who are now accustomed to streaming -

legally and illegally - or watching bite-size highlights rather than full matches. As such, she predicts the media rights landscape will shift dramatically when the current cycle is over.

"What we have to remember in sport is our viewer, and our young viewers," she told Bloomberg. "Young viewers, they absorb football very quickly but their attention spans are

not as long. "I think the media rights landscape will change dramatically and I think we have to see a much more robust direct-to-consumer model built out over the next five to six

years. "The Premier League, which I love and know very, very well, has been supported by some very solid media rights deals. But those will eventually, in the next four years, start to

move away. "And we have to be able to understand how do our young people [consume], how do we grab their attention? And how do we monetise our assets?" Staveley has been a firm

advocate in trying to improve the media consumption ever since she joined the board of directors at Newcastle in 2020 following the Saudi-led consortium takeover which she helped broker.

When she was at Newcastle, one of her roles was as part of the Rights, Access and Facilities Framework, a Premier League body established to try and squeeze out more value from their rights.

Among the group’s ideas was to give broadcasters greater behind-the-scenes access. It is a proposal that is now believed to have been put to Premier League clubs in a bid to ensure

broadcasters feel they are getting better value for their money, and stop the valuation of the rights slipping even further. The Guardian reports that the Premier League has written to

Newcastle and all clubs to request they give broadcasters extra access. Under the league’s proposals each club would be obliged to allow dressing-room access, a half-time player interview or

an interview with a substituted player at two home games. The broadcasters are most interested in dressing-room footage, with foreign rights holders - particularly NBC in the United States,

where media access is taken to a different level. It is reported, however, that the 'Big Six' are reluctant to grant the request with a suspicion that they want to save

behind-the-scenes content for their own channels. Article continues below The league needs 14 clubs to take its side if it is to make a contractual commitment to the broadcasters. The

proposal will go before the AGM next month.