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High Court: football fixtures are copyrighted

Published:Monday | April 26, 2010 | 12:00 AM
Everton's Yakubu Ayegbeni (second left) vies for the ball against Fulham's Jonathan Greening (left) during their English Premier League soccer match at Goodison Park, Liverpool, England, yesterday. - AP

LONDON (AP):

Betting companies and newspapers will have to pay to use and publish lists of football fixtures after Britain's High Court ruled Friday that the lists are protected by copyright law.

The English Premier League and four other bodies brought a case against companies, including the British subsidiary of Yahoo Inc., over their unlicensed use of fixtures.

The European Court of Justice ruled in 2004 against protection of fixture lists, but the High Court agreed with the Premier League that the work that goes into the scheduling of matches was sufficient to justify protection under so-called database copyright law.

Schedulers' Concerns

Concerns for schedulers include preventing teams from the same city playing at home on the same day, the demands of television and keeping many dates free to allow for European and international competition.

"The process of preparing fixture lists involves very significant labor and skill in satisfying the multitude of often competing requirements of those involved," Judge Christopher Floyd said. "(It is) not mere sweat of the brow, by which I mean the application of rigid criteria to the processing of data.

"The quality of the solution depends in part on the skill of those involved."


  • Standings

LONDON (AP): Standings in English Premier League football after yesterday's games:

Team

GP W D L GF GA Pts

Chelsea 36 25 5 6 93 32 80
  • Man Utd 36 25 4 7 81 28 79
  • Arsenal 36 22 6 8 78 39 72
  • Tottenham 35 19 7 9 63 37 64
  • Aston Villa 36 17 13 6 51 35 64
  • Man City 35 17 12 6 69 42 63
  • Liverpool 36 18 8 10 61 33 62
  • Everton 36 15 12 9 59 49 57
  • Birmingham 36 12 11 13 35 44 47
  • Sunderland 36 11 11 14 47 53 44
  • Blackburn 36 11 11 14 38 54 44
  • Fulham 35 11 10 14 36 39 43
  • Stoke 35 10 13 12 33 44 43
  • Bolton 36 9 9 18 40 65 36
  • Wolves 36 8 11 17 29 52 35
  • Wigan 36 9 8 19 35 69 35
  • West Ham 36 8 10 18 44 62 34
  • Hull 36 6 10 20 32 73 28
  • Burnley 36 7 6 23 37 78 27

    x-Portsmouth 36 6 7 23 31 64 16

    x-deducted 9 points for breaching financial regulations.