'Secret tape' threat in ITV war

SECRET tape-recordings of a meeting with ITV Digital chief executive Stuart Prebble are to be used by the Football League in the fight for money it claims it is owed for broadcast rights.

The League has threatened to sue the broadcaster's parents, Carlton and Granada, for more than £500m if they refuse to honour the League's contract with ITV Digital, which has gone into administration.

Carlton and Granada insist they did not guarantee the contract and on Friday they issued a writ against the League with the aim of securing a High Court ruling on whether they should be forced to pick up ITV Digital's liability.

But it emerged this weekend that the League has a tape of a meeting that took place between Prebble and all 72 club chairmen at Notts County's ground on 29 November last year.

At the meeting, Prebble was asked about the prospects for ITV Digital. According to David Burns, the League's chief executive, Prebble insisted that Carlton and Granada backed the company completely.

Burns told Financial Mail: 'Yes, Stuart Prebble was taped when he addressed the chairmen at Notts County. We tape the meetings routinely. He gave us every reason to believe that Carlton and Granada were fully behind ITV Digital.'

Any evidence that ITV Digital led football clubs to think that their payments for broadcast rights were guaranteed by Carlton and Granada will be used by the League to support its claim for the money it says it is owed.

Deloitte & Touche, in charge of ITV Digital since it went into administration last month, will return to the High Court tomorrow. The administrators are not expected to ask Carlton and Granada for more money to keep ITV Digital ticking over while Deloitte tries to sell parts of the business or restructure it.

Restructuring plans could involve approaching BSkyB and the BBC or venture capitalists to take over elements of the business.

Meanwhile, it has emerged that ITV Digital told the League last month that it planned to pull the plug on its subscription sport channel, ITV Sport. The channel would show live football games only until 2003 and then transfer them to its free digital channel, ITV2.