Eighteen million people in England and Wales claim to be football supporters - 35 per cent of the population. More lucratively, the support is concentrated around a few clubs: while 14 million claim to support Premiership teams, half that figure give their allegiance to either Manchester United (3.3 million) Liverpool (2.2 million) or Newcastle (1.4 million). And the news keeps getting better for TV executives. Almost three-quarters of the supporters are male, they are generally better-off than the population as a whole and very few of them (5 per cent) actually claim to visit a ground in the course of a season. That's a lot of money waiting to be shaken free from the trees. Early estimates available to the football authorities reckoned that PPV could bring Premiership clubs an average of £25 million extra each per season, with much more for the bigger clubs. A 1998 report reckoned that Manchester United, Liverpool and Newcastle United alone would take in £224 million per season.

There are difficulties though. The bigger clubs, with their grounds full virtually all season, would be unaffected by PPV availability; but evidence suggests that smaller, less fashionable clubs would not only attract very few subscribers - they would lose customers coming through the turnstiles. Live attendances would fall at least 15 per cent in some areas for Saturday games, with even bigger losses for midweek matches.

Would PPV revenues for these clubs outweigh the loss of attendance? Would big clubs compensate their more humble brethren?

The Premiership bosses recognised the difficulties and rejected a Sky proposal for the 1998-99 season which would have put four matches a week on PPV. The reasons were varied: bigger clubs felt they would benefit more from forming their own channels (Manchester United's MUTV expects to have PPV availability for the season after next); other clubs felt that if the ordinary rights fees continued to soar in the way they have in the US, they would fare better under the revenue-sharing arrangements. Both arguments have been proven right.

Now the market is even more complicated. Clubs are launching their own channels in anticipation of a PPV bonanza; but Sky is likely to hold out for the biggest matches. Then there is the arrival of digital TV and the revived interest from the traditional terrestrial stations such as the BBC, Channel Five and ITV. Clubs believe maintaining a presence in front of the traditional audience is essential to keep sponsors happy and maintain popularity. The challenge for any PPV deal is to keep the league from breaking apart. Resentments between richer and poorer clubs are already acute enough.