Broadcasters will bid for the live media rights for 46 Premiere League games ahead of the start of the season in eight weeks. Bids must be lodged tomorrow.
Sky is the favourite to scoop the majority of the package taking the total number of games it will show in the next season to the maximum permitted under EU rules. It could air five of the six batches of games.
Sky has already secured the rights to air Monday evening games for the 2010-11 season with a three-year deal that will again see it control a maximum of five packages.
Disney-owned specialist sports broadcaster ESPN, which owns a UK digital channel, is the front runner to pick up the final batch of 26 Saturday teatime games for the upcoming season.
Pay-to-watch service Top Up TV is another potential bidder. It is backed by Russian-American industrialist Len Blavatnik, whose Access Industries walked away from rescue talks with Setanta on Friday.
Setanta was unable to meet its £10m Premier League payment deadline on Friday. BT Vision has stopped selling Setanta Sport to new customers while it reviews the situation.
The company has signed up about 1.2 million subscribers - and it needs 1.9 million to break even. It is believed to be operating at an annual loss of almost £100m. New subscriptions were suspended this month and the business has also missed a £3m payment to the Scottish Premier League. Setanta shareholders include Doughty Hanson, Balderton Capital and Goldman Sachs.
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