Setanta strikes highlights deal with ITV
- Published: 11 September 2008 16:45
- Author: Kate McMahon
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- Last Updated: 11 September 2008 17:26
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ITV1 will broadcast England's 4-1 victory in the over Croatia tonight, after signing a belated deal with Setanta.
The thrilling World Cup qualifier match will be shown as a one-hour special at 10.35pm on ITV1, allowing millions of England fans to watch what has already become a famous victory for Fabio Capello and his team.
ITV will also use the highlights for a special programme to be broadcast in the lead up to the next qualifier which will be shown live on ITV1, England v Kazakhstan at home on 11 October.
The deal comes after Setanta rejected bids from Channel 4, the BBC and ITV prior to the match, as payment offers to show the highlights were considered too low.
In return, the terrestrial broadcasters accused Setanta of preventing fans from being able to watch the game. Setanta screened a last-minute unencrypted free-to-air highlights show after failing to sell the package on to another broadcaster.
Theo Walcott scored a hat trick in the match, with live coverage giving Setanta Sports its biggest audience on record last night (10 September).
The match had an average audience of 1.4m (7.3% multichannel share), during its two-hour broadcast from 8pm, marking the first time the broadcaster has broken the 1m barrier.
In a statement, Setanta said the agreement with ITV would be "first-step towards ensuring that the highlights of future internationals involving the home nations will be seen by the largest possible audience."
Trevor East, director of sport at Setanta, said: "Setanta will continue to take steps to try to agree sensible and realistic commercial terms with terrestrial broadcasters so that highlights of future international games will be made available to as many television viewers as possible."
Mark Sharman, director of ITV News and Sport, said: "We're pleased to have secured the highlights of last night's 4-1 victory. We know there is a huge demand to watch England and we're glad we can offer fans a chance to see the action."
