key factors that constrained the pre-Sky television revenues of the Football League ( LRB , 30 August ). The first was the collusion between ITV and the BBC in refusing to bid against each other, such that the Football League never received more than 3.1 million a year for TV rights. It was British Satellite Broadcasting (BSB), not Sky TV, which broke up this cosy cartel, persuading all but one of the 92 league clubs to sign an exclusive deal in 1988. The absence of the final signature -- Liverpool's -- gave ITV a chance to appeal to a meeting of the whole league, offering to match the BSB price, and to support it with cash guarantees (something BSB's parent companies had declined to do). The BBC refused to join ITV in defence of their joint rights; indeed, it offered to work with BSB, just as it later agreed to bring back the Match of the Day highlights format in support of BSkyB's successful bid for live rights in 1992 (BSkyB was the entity that resulted from the 1990 merger of BSB and Sky). The second constraint was the league's insistence on protecting attendances at Saturday matches. The 44 million deal signed with ITV in 1988 allowed just 18 league matches a year to be televised live -- none on a Saturday. This contract covered all 92 league clubs. The present Premier League deal provides for 154 live matches each year, while the lower divisions have their own TV deals,