The Premier League has succeeded in attracting a new online player to pay for live rights to top-flight football, albeit at a heavily discounted price.

It is understood that the two packages of matches which failed to meet their reserve prices in an auction in February have now been sold.

According to industry sources BT has secured one of the packages and the other has fallen to a new rival. The identity of the new Premier League broadcaster is due to be unveiled at a meeting of top clubs on Thursday, with speculation still focused on Amazon and Facebook.

For BT the deal will take its total number of live matches to 52 per season, up from 42 under its previous contract.

Football bosses had hoped interest from the online giants would spark a fierce bidding war in the auction earlier this year. Instead the main packages were bought by the existing broadcasters BT and Sky, who between them paid £4.46bn, £640m less than under their previous three-year contracts.