No England terrestrial coverage tonight as Setanta holds out

LONDON - There will be no terrestrial coverage of England's grudge match against Croatia tonight due to the continuing impasse between rights holder Setanta and the BBC and ITV over the value of the highlights.

England will be hoping to avenge home and away defeats by Croatia in the qualifying campaign for Euro 2008. The defeats ended England's hopes of qualifying for the tournament.

Setanta, which paid £5m for the exclusive rights to cover the match, is understood to have asked terrestrial channels to pay £1m for the rights to show highlights.

It is thought that the best offer for the highlights was £250,000 from ITV, while the BBC is understood to have offered £200,000.

A spokesperson for Setanta said that to date it hasn't received a proposal that makes commercial sense.

However, fans will be able to listen to the match on Radio 5 Live from 8pm tonight.

Setanta's coverage of England's 2-0 victory over Andorra on Saturday evening was watched by less than 1m people in the UK, one of the lowest audiences for a competitive England match.

Last year, Setanta won the live rights to around 90 qualifying matches ahead of the 2010 World Cup in South Africa. They include most of the away games for England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland.

ITV holds the rights to show England's home international matches and a number of friendlies, including England's away match against Germany in November.

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