A press ban at the Manchester City vs Norwich match was averted on Monday night after the Premier and Football Leagues extended negotiations with newspaper publishers.
Talks on the accreditation for photographers and reporters will continue under existing licensing arrangements while both sides take stock of what is becoming an increasingly nasty row over match reports.
Meanwhile, a rumour swept sports picture agencies that Football Dataco, on behalf of the leagues, was about to sign a deal with just one agency – the Press Association-for the exclusive supply of match pictures.
David Jacobs of Action Images said the sports agencies had had verbal assurances before the recent breakdown in talks that they would be able to go on supplying pictures. Now, he believed, an exclusive deal with a single company was on the cards since the leagues had said they could not give that assurance.
Dan Johnson for the Premiership firmly denied any deal with PA. “We have not done a deal. We have never had any discussions about it. It is not on our agenda” he said.
A PA spokeswoman said the agency never disclosed details of commercial discussions and could not comment
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