THE bumper new TV deal for Premier League football announced this week came as little shock to many.

Even in the days of austerity, football has avoided any big hit to its attraction and as such can still demand the biggest fees for its screening rights.

I suppose it also illustrates the amount Sky TV must be making to be able to virtually blow any other runners, aside from relative newcomers BT Sport, out of the water.

Prior to the news about the renewed football rights, the satellite giants also secured the rights to The Open golf championship from 2017 – a deal which sees the traditional British event leave terrestrial television for the first time after 60 years on the BBC.

It means The Open follows England Test match cricket and Formula One in selling its soul to Rupert Murdoch’s empire.

With many of us having Sky in our homes these days, there is hardly the uproar you may once have had and many of us understand that money talks.

But that doesn’t make it right.

With most of my television viewing concentrated on sport, I folded years ago in my opposition to Sky, knowing that it was inevitable the way things would go and I would only be cutting my nose off to spite my face and miss the big cricket and football games I enjoy watching when I am not out there as a fan or reporter.

But I have drawn a line at just Sky Sports on my subscription. I refuse to add BT Sport – just as I did previously with Setanta and ESPN.

There will be many who don’t and I suspect the fact the Champions League is heading away from free-to-air TV soon will only increase subscribers for BT.

But where does it stop? We already fork out for a TV licence and then have any satellite fees on top of that and it is a big dent in the bank balance each month.

I suppose it is supply and demand – if no-one wanted to watch live sport from the comfort of their armchair then these satellite companies would not be in such a position of strength.

I fear we are now down a road that has no gaps in the central reservation for a u-turn.

The latest big event begins this weekend in the shape of the Cricket World Cup in Australia and New Zealand and Sky will be all over it despite it being played in the early hours of the morning over here.

Thankfully, we can still listen to radio coverage on the Beeb through Test Match Special and their superb coverage featuring the likes of Bolton’s Charles Dagnall and that is what I will be doing while wrapped up in bed.

I anticipate many a red-eyed morning at The Bolton News offices in the coming weeks.