Premier League chairman rubbishes Liverpool's claim for greater international broadcasting revenues

By Andrew Warshaw

October 18 – Premier League chairman Sir Dave Richards is the latest high-profile figure to denounce Liverpool’s demand for a greater share of overseas broadcasting revenue.

Last week, Ian Ayre, Liverpool’s managing director, suggested England’s major clubs should receive a greater share from international television rights because of their bigger fan base, and even be able to negotiate their own individual deals like in Spain.

But speaking in the United Arab Emirates, Richards described Liverpool’s proposal as “rubbish”.

“The secret to the league is in what they call the founding members agreement and the founding members agreement states that the wealth will be shared 50, 25, 25 and overseas TV will be split equally,” Richards said.

“And it will stay like that because the founding members, that’s what they wanted to do, that’s what they are doing and that’s what they will do in the future.

“You can’t take one club and say, ‘Well OK, because we are Liverpool…’

“What about the Boltons, the Blackburns, the Wigans?

“It’s got to be fair for everyone.”

Unlike domestically, where only the first 50 per cent of UK broadcast revenue is split equally among all the clubs, the overseas deal, worth £1.4 billion ($2.2 billion/€1.6 billion), is shared equally by the 20 clubs.

“At some point we definitely feel there has to be some rebalance because what we are actually doing is disadvantaging ourselves against the other big European clubs,” Ayre said last week.

“If you are in Kuala Lumpur there isn’t anyone subscribing to Astro or ESPN to watch Bolton; the large majority are subscribing because they want to watch Liverpool, Manchester United, Chelsea or Arsenal.

“So is it right that the international rights are shared equally between all the clubs?”

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