The SFA are pushing ahead with plans for virtual season tickets for the 2019/20 season.
Officially the 2020/21 SPFL season is scheduled to start on August 1 but there is a question mark over that date with social distancing in place crowds will be limited or played Behind Closed Doors.
Celtic have around 50,000 season ticket holders but its debateable whether there will be a full house in the new season with broadcasting options being explored.
The in-house Celtic TV service already broadcasts all domestic fixtures to subscribers outside Scotland and Ireland with an expansion of that service an obvious solution.
Last month the SFA set up a number of working groups, in their first update under the sub-title Broadcast and Innovation, the report states:
Discussion areas
- Broadcast and content opportunities.
- Online streaming, UK & overseas (including payment mechanisms), in the event of behind closed doors (“BCD”) games or partially BCD games becoming necessary.
- ‘Virtual season tickets’.
- Radio, club channels and broadcast partner interaction.
- Blocked hours.
- SPFL media licences.
Next steps
- A review of the SPFL’s 2019/20 and 2020/21 broadcast contracts and summarise key terms for the sub-group.
- Working group to be created to focus on media licences and innovation.
- Working group to be created to explore principles of behind closed doors or a hybrid model for Premiership (including technical, operational and pricing); separate group to discuss the above for Championship to League Two.
Sky Sports has an exclusive contract to show SPFL matches next season but recent contracts have only permitted four matches from Celtic Park to be shown.
