By Koh Yizhe

Remember the days when sports fans only needed to pay less than $30 a month for their sports fix? That was, of course, back in 2006 when another $20 would get you all the matches of the 2006 FIFA World Cup.

Not bad eh? Oh how we wish for those days now!

Fast forward a year or so, and maybe not the in the best of moves, StarHub pumped up their price for the sports package to $25. To buy the sports package, you must first subscribe to three basic groups which costs about $25 or so in total. The final cost? $52.43. Of course, they give you a brand new channel – the football channel along with other sports channels (Goal TV) to cater to the “real” football fan. Other leagues were also shown on these channels.

In doing so, however, they took away the English Premier League rights from ESPN Star Sports. So instead of pundits that really know their stuff, they gave us new guys that throw their tempers on air. (Yeah, wassup with that?)

But football is already a lifestyle for a lot of people so no choice, luh. People were still willing to pay – you want your football, you pay! Makes sense, but supporting a team has never been so expensive. At least we get all the major leagues in the world – really good stuff for a couch potato (I mean, who will have all the time in the world to watch so many channels?!).

Not only football, but other sports “belonged” to StarHub as well. Tennis, Major League Baseball, American Football, Formula One, along with the NBA and Golf, were all shown on StarHub channels. Fans of these sports sometimes blame football and football fans for the increase in price as it gives them a huge headache. But at least, it is all via one service provider.

Then comes along little old SingTel which decides to crash the party with its own brand of cable TV. They start bidding for Champions League matches and eventually got it for the 2009/10 season, making us feel the pain fans of other sports experience. Which to choose?

Then SingTel sucker punches StarHub and announced it has won the rights to the English Premier League for three season starting August 2010.

So now, only one cable operator will provide both the EPL and the Champions League. Phew, what a relief!

Or is it?

Along with the EPL, SingTel also took ESPN Star Sports which give them the rights to certain sporting events sports such as the FA Cup, Formula One, the Australian Open, Wimbledon, the US Open Golf Championship and the NBA.

And the rest? They are the survivors of the raid. The funniest has to be that of the Tennis circuit. What do Tennis fans do when the US Open and French Open are shown on StarHub while the Australian Open and Wimbledon are on SingTel mio TV?

What about the Spanish League? Wrestling? Golf?

Yet another unanswered question (and it’s a big one) is the 2010 World Cup. Who will get it? And more importantly, how much (more) will it cost?

StarHub will have to try their best to get it to maintain their business, while it would be so much easier for us if SingTel got it.

If only SingTel had stuck to selling internet connections and phones, instead of venturing into the cable television space, we wouldn’t have to suffer.

So who are the biggest losers?

Us.