11 Sep 2008Brown offers sympathy to England fans

Football Sponsors/ Sponsorship and Media

Prime minister Gordon Brown has claimed today (September 11th) that it is "unfortunate" that more fans could not watch this week's international football.

A paltry 290,000 viewers were able to tune in to watch highlights of England's thumping win over Croatia after Setanta failed to agree a deal for the rights with ITV and the BBC.

Furious supporters have called for World Cup qualifiers to be added to the list of protected events which must be shown on terrestrial television, and Mr Brown has admitted he sympathises.

He said: "It is perhaps a little unfortunate that large numbers of people were not able to see the match live.

"And that is something that I think a lot of supporters will want to have answers to."

A total of 1.55 million people tuned in to Setanta to see England's thrilling 4-1 victory, a figure which pales in comparison to the 11 million who saw the previous meeting between the two last November.

Mr Brown congratulated the other home nations on their creditable performances, while also singling out Arsenal's 19-year-old hat-trick hero Theo Walcott for special praise.

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