BT Sport will be rebranded as TNT Sports in July.
The news follows the creation of a joint venture between BT Group and Warner Bros Discovery (WBD) in September after BT’s discussions with DAZN broke down.
WBD has paid more than £600million ($752.7m) to BT Sport to set up the joint venture, which means the Premier League will be broadcast on a new domestic channel for the first time in a decade.
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“This change marks the next logical step for BT Sport,” said Marc Allera, chairman of BT Group. “This will become a hugely exciting new premium sports offering for customers in the UK and Ireland.”
The Athletic breaks down what this means…
What does this mean for BT Sport subscribers?
In the short term, nothing.
Allera and Andrew Georgiou, the president and managing director of WBD Sports Europe, stressed the transition would be seamless and the only noticeable change will be that BT Sport will be named TNT Sports.
Its content portfolio will stay as it is and people will still be able to watch it on the same channel number via Sky and Virgin.
One change that will come into effect later this year is TNT Sports’ portfolio is going to be added to the Discovery Plus app, which means you can stream it online.
Is the monthly subscription price going to change?
Neither Allera nor Georgiou offered assurances on whether fans will have to pay more to subscribe to TNT Sports.
“It is impossible to say things are permanent and never change,” Allera said. “There are no immediate plans for any change of pricing, but it is a market that moves fast.”
There are, however, unlikely to be any price hikes throughout 2023.
Why did they pick TNT Sports as a new name?
TNT Sports, according to Georgiou, is a brand that has a “legacy across the world of sport in many different markets”.
In the United States, TNT Sports has been a partner of the NBA for more than 30 years and broadcasts the NHL. It also shows the Champions League in Mexico and Brazil, and the Premier League in Argentina and Chile.
The company wants consistency for the brand globally, even if TNT Sports is obscure in the UK.
“The British and Irish consumer has no clue (about TNT Sports),” Georgiou said, “so this is a clean slate and a fundamental part of the decision-making process.”
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Before settling on the name, WBD carried out focus group research with football supporters to see whether the name would resonate. They said the reaction was positive.
What does this mean for the 3pm blackout?
Article 48 of UEFA’s statutes allows member nations to select a two-and-a-half-hour weekend slot where live football is banned from screens. Some reports suggest its origins date back to the 1950s but in England, the rule only emerged in 1987 when ITV struck a major television deal with the Football League.
The regulation remains in place and even stops foreign matches from being shown live between 2.45pm and 5.15pm in the UK.
Though Sky Sports and the Premier League remain in favour of the 3pm blackout, Georgiou said WBD is yet to engage on the matter.
“We would like to hear from the Premier League and the EFL,” Georgiou said. “The EFL is going to market right now around what they think is the best outcome from a consumer perspective. Once they have decided on what that looks like, we will sit down and work out what that means for us as a business moving forward.
“At this stage, there has been no change in the current 3pm window.”
Will it rival Sky Sports for domestic TV rights?
BT Sport’s Premier League offering is the 12.30pm slot on Saturdays. It also has exclusive rights to broadcast the Champions League, Europa League and Europa Conference League in the UK.
This cycle of Premier League broadcast rights ends in 2025 and it will not be long before the tender process for bids to be lodged opens.
Now it is backed by the deep pockets of WBD, there is every chance the new joint venture will look to compete with Sky Sports for a bigger slice of the pie.
Asked how important the next set of Premier League rights will be for TNT Sports, Allera said: “We never comment on auctions or hint at what we are thinking.”
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“This is a premium service and we intend to remain to be a premium service,” Georgiou added. “What that means in terms of what our approach to any rights auction would be is to maintain that position in the marketplace.”
Have people lost their jobs because of the acquisition?
Yes.
Although Allera said more than 200 members of staff have moved across from BT Sport to WBD, there is no guarantee their jobs will remain.
When pressed on whether they can offer assurances to staff, Georgiou was unable to do so.
“The context of what we need as a business versus what BT Sport needed is very different,” he said. “We don’t have as many positions available in WBD as there were in BT Sport. We have said to the BT Sport staff that if they would like to apply for those positions, they will have priority.”
Employees who do not wish to work for WBD or find there is no position for them will be offered a redundancy package.
How much are football fans having to pay to watch their team?
Having access to watch your team on TV is not cheap, and there is no guarantee their game will be picked by UK broadcasters. The cost of acquiring the rights has risen exponentially since the Premier League’s inception in 1992 and is now a multi-billion pound auction.
The most recent UK auction for the 2022-25 cycle was worth a combined £5billion ($6bn).
Sky Sports is the biggest player in the UK market and has the rights to show 128 matches a year, whereas BT Sport has the rights to 52 fixtures a season.
A basic Sky Q box will set you back £26 a month, but adding a Sky Sports package takes the monthly cost to £46. If you were to add BT Sport on top of your Sky subscription, then that will cost a further £28 a month, taking the overall price to £74 per month.
Amazon Prime has the rights to stream 20 Premier League games — across two match rounds — a season. Although its Prime membership encompasses more than football, it charges £95 a year or £8.99 a month.
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A standalone monthly pass to watch BT Sport costs £29.99.
Is Eurosport being given a new name?
Not yet.
Eurosport 1 and Eurosport 2 fall under WBD’s umbrella and, at least in the UK, will be best known for having the broadcast rights to the Olympic Games.
Georgiou ruled out any changes to Eurosport’s name before the Paris Olympics in 2024. The expectation is that the channel will be rebranded before 2026.
(Top photo: Craig Foy/SNS Group via Getty Images)