Sky gets red card over football deal

Sky was shown the red card by the stock market yesterday as it almost doubled its investment in the Premier League to secure the lion’s share of top-flight TV football rights in a £5bn (€6.9bn) battle with BT.

Shares in the satellite broadcaster fell 2% after it agreed to pay £4.17bn to retain five of seven available packages, including a new Friday night slot, while rival BT Sport will pay £960m for matches including Saturday evening fixtures.

It came during another lacklustre session for the London market, with the FTSE 100 Index down 11 points to 6,818.2 amid continued jitters over Greece as eurozone finance ministers met in Brussels to discuss its request to ease its bailout programme.