By Peh Shing Huei
China Bureau Chief
shpeh@sph.com.sg

 

In Beijing

TO BE an English Premier League fan in China is to be a very sad man.

While those in Singapore get a regular diet of EPL matches through cable TV almost every weekend, the ones here are starved of their Manchester United and Everton.

Since last year, EPL games have pretty much disappeared from the living rooms of mainland China.

The vanishing act started when a small pay-television station from the southern Guangdong province bought the exclusive rights to broadcast live matches in China.

The station, Tiansheng TV or WinTV, reportedly paid US$50 million for the three-year deal. That took the screening rights from ESPN Star and state-run China Central Television (CCTV), which used to broadcast the games free or at a cheap price.

Singapore EPL viewers would be familiar with something similar, when StarHub outbid ESPN Star for the rights to EPL matches last year.

But the difference is that while StarHub managed to get most EPL fans in Singapore to sign up for its package after some grumbles, WinTV has failed to do the same in China.

That is largely because Chinese viewers have been used to watching it for free and refuse to pay an extraordinary large sum of about 188 yuan (S$40) per month. It costs S$49 for Singapore viewers to watch the game back home, but average income in Singapore is about 15 times that of China's.

It didn't help that WinTV boss was rather smug when he obtained the rights. "The fans will have to endure the pain of the change. Let's say goodbye to free Premier League. No more free lunch in the future," said WinTV president Song Zheng. "Fans can enjoy the games in various convenient ways, and right now - they have to pay."

Also, WinTV does not have the nation-wide reach that StarHub enjoys, making it cumbersome for Chinese fans to sign up.

Viewership of EPL games thus plunged from an estimated 10 million to about 20,000. Chinese football fans turned to the Italian Serie A, the Spanish La Liga and the German Bundesliga, which are all available free-to-air channels.

The hardcore EPL fans, mostly foreigners, are reduced to begging, hunting or even taking on the law.

1) Begging

- The really desperate ones would beg friends or family back home to have video conferencing during matches and turn their webcams onto the TVs in Singapore. The plus is that they can still enjoy games from the comfort of their homes. The tradeoff is hopelessly poor resolution and erratic connection. There is also the option of streaming, but the performance is unstable. Erm, was that a goal?

2) Hunting

- Those who refuse to squint their eyes or simply do not have any friends back home would pound the streets hunting for a pub which screens the games. The pubs do so by installing a satellite dish. Resolution is great, screens are usually huge, but there are pubs which refuse to screen the games with volume. So if you dig silent football, sure. You also have to put up with smoky joints. And if your team loses, the cold ride or walk home late at night in winter Beijing adds to the pain.

3) Knock, knock

- Last, install a satellite dish at your apartment which would allow you to get Sky Sports and you are back in Singapore - EPL games in your living room! But there is a snag. Satellite dishes are illegal in China. So if you get a knock on your door in the middle of the night, it may be time to say goodbye to Cristiano Ronaldo.

So yes, it is a tricky life to be an EPL fan in China. Good luck if you are one.