NTL plays for extra time at Premium

TROUBLED cable group NTL has asked for more time to file accounts for its Premium TV sports investment arm. Premium, which employs 200 people, went on a three-year £150m spending spree, buying stakes or lending money to football clubs Newcastle United, Leicester City, Aston Villa, Middlesbrough and Glasgow Rangers.

It also made investments in rugby clubs and in sponsoring the British Lions tour of Australia last summer.

But Premium has seen the value of investments plummet by at least £63m - just as its parent, NTL, is itself under severe pressure from investors. NTL has debts of £11bn.

Premium should have filed accounts for 2000 by 16 October. Instead it has asked for an extension because the company is 'carrying on business outside the UK'. It now says it will file by the end of the year. In 1999, it lost £6.2m.

Premium chief executive Geoffrey Hamilton-Fairley said: 'The situation is complicated because the parent company, NTL, is US-based and all of our money comes from there.

'There are many subsidiaries that are having problems with accounting for money which comes from overseas. It is a compliance thing, but we are fully funded.' So far, there is little to show for investments made by Premium.

'We are getting money from advertising, sponsorship, e-commerce and betting,' said Hamilton-Fairley. 'We expect to be cashflowpositive by the end of 2003.'