EFL TV Rights Deal 24/25 to 28/29 - Goodbye iFollow

Fair enough. I'm guessing.
It must be more than last season though based on our results being much better and our crowds being much higher.

 

I’d agree, but I do side with the thought we’ll be relatively worse off going forward.
At the moment we’ll have far more ifollow income than rivals, whereas going forward (I assume), income will be evenly distributed.

 

The Athletic printed it a few weeks back in a Wrexham article about the differences they'll face financially after promotion. They were talking about the change in TV revenue going from being on BT every week to being on ifollow for about 8 games a season.

It said we made the most this past season in L2 from ifollow at just under £300K (If I remember rightly) for the season. However this was a one off season for all teams as ifollow had every game broadcast from mid November until after the Jan new years games, whilst the world cup break was on. So this season everyone did well from ifollow but those aren't sustainable numbers as no team will have as many games as this season in broadcast going forward under ifollow.

 

The Club must have thought the deal was better for us as they voted for it. If we were going to be worse off then surely they would have voted against it?

 

i presume the sky money is guaranteed , i follow is unknown. Have a poor season and paying numbers would be down.
How many would have paid for Crewe , if we were mid table and the game had nothing on it?

 

Exactly this, it will be nailed on income for every team. I know on his podcast the Peterborough chairman always has a go at the iFollow service when it gets brought up usually for how up and down the service is but I think he's always had a gripe over the pay distribution.

You can go back and find the podcast but him and Sparks talked about it during the behind closed doors season, one of the biggest stumbling blocks financially for clubs was getting the ifollow payment method changed, so clubs actually got a larger cut of the sales. Ifollow didn't want to do that, but the EFL negotiated some middle ground package where nothing clubs get a split of the revenues.

Under the restructured deal, the away clubs only get money from 500 away sales onwards. The Oxford chairman broke it down in an interview.... "For home League games, the Club receives 70% of the subscription fee with the rest going to pay for the service. For home cup games, the net money is split between both Clubs.

For away League games, the home Club keeps the money from the first 500 away supporters but anything over this number is paid to the away Club, so it does directly benefit Oxford United if significant numbers of our supporters pay to watch away games on iFollow."

They may well have changed it since without an announcement but I can't find one, so its safe to assume we are still on that contract? So Crewe away for example, if only 499 people paid £10 to watch that game, the club will have made absolutely nothing. I know that won't have happened for a club our size, but your smaller followed clubs, there's a good chance they don't make a penny from ifollow on away matches. So the Sky deal is far more beneficial for most of the league.

 

Seems to say iFollow will be scrapped and the Saturday embargo kept in place

 

Yeah I've noticed some of the "look at the Wrexham success fairytale" type articles out in the media are very selective about the things they print in relation to money. Some articles it's like they are trying their best to find a way of bringing up the success without mentioning the money it's taken to get them from mid-table to champions in 2 years.

 

City state that they get every penny from an ifollow purchase. I think things changed post-covid.

 

Good spot, can't find any release from the EFL but imagine they changed it after 2021. Oxford site still says they make £8.34 from every £10, someone needs to update!

 

Are Sky trying to kill off IFollow?

 

Doesn’t mean that we voted for it though.

 

They have. I believe with this deal. IFollow is done.

 

I suppose both are correct! City get the £10 directly and then pay the VAT on it.

 

The articles say the all 72 clubs voted unanimously for it.

 

£8.34 is the money generated as tax is removed. So both are factually correct

 

Fair enough then.

 

Jeremy Hunt and the Conservatives are a set of c…s So it’s no shock!