BT shoots to the Sky with free Champions League and Europe's first 4K channel

BT shoots to the Sky with free Champions League and Europe's first 4K channel
BT shoots to the Sky with free Champions League and Europe's first 4K channel

BT has announced that it will offer 351 matches from the Champions League and Europa League as of next season, and if you are a BT TV customer you'll get the whole package for free.

The Champions League was nabbed by BT for big money last year - the telecoms giant paid £897 million for the coverage which was originally split between Sky and ITV.

BT has created a new channel for all of this European football. Called BT Sport Europe, the channel will host live Champions League coverage, hosted by Gary Lineker, Jake Humphrey and Rio Ferdinand and will be free to existing BT TV customers.

It will cost £5 if you sign up to BT's broadband and TV offerings and if you just want the channel, without any BT sign up, then the current price is £13.50 a month.

4K footie

BT has also revealed that it will show some of the games for free on a new channel called BT Sport Showcase. And if that wasn't enough to rile the likes of Sky, it has also announced that it will be offering up 4K football later in the year.

BT Sport Ultra HD will be available through a new BT TV Ultra HD set-top box and will be Europe's first Ultra HD channel.

Sky doesn't seem to worried about the loss of Champions League football, though, or it's at least putting on a brave face.

In a recent blog post, Barney Francis, Managing Director, Sky Sports, was quite damning about the league noting that: "The Champions League accounts for just 2.5% of Sky Sports viewing, while the Premier League is seven times bigger."

Table two, your saucer of milk is waiting.

Marc Chacksfield

Marc Chacksfield is the Editor In Chief, Shortlist.com at DC Thomson. He started out life as a movie writer for numerous (now defunct) magazines and soon found himself online - editing a gaggle of gadget sites, including TechRadar, Digital Camera World and Tom's Guide UK. At Shortlist you'll find him mostly writing about movies and tech, so no change there then.