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Boro will meet with a group of Championship big hitters today to draw up ‘drastic action’ battle plans against the controversial new Football League TV deal.

The five-year deal with Sky Sports, worth £595m and due to start next season, has been agreed by the nine member Football League board.

But a powerful group of clubs are bitterly opposed to the deal insisting it undervalues the product, saying it has been foisted upon them and that the red button broadcast proposals will make a massive dent in gates.

They also believe a five-year deal is a strategic mistake at a time when the broadcast landscape is changing rapidly with the growth of rival streaming and online services.

One senior executive said: “The Football League board has just started a war.”

(Image: Katie Lunn)

Boro will be among the clubs who will gather at Villa Park today to discuss their next move in what could be a bruising battle.

Possible counter-moves include a bid to remove chief executive Shaun Harvey and the board, a demand to renegotiate the entire agreement, or a legal challenge to the arrangement saying the full financial implications and technical specifications were never spelled out to the clubs when it was presented as a done deal.

There is also a ‘nuclear’ option of the clubs breaking away from the Football League, which would be the biggest seismic shift in the game since the formation of the Premier League in 1992.

The leaders of the resistance to the deal are those clubs who are shown most on TV, including Leeds, Aston Villa and Derby, but Boro chiefs are understood to strongly support their stance.

Some reports suggest 21 out of the 24 Championship clubs are unhappy with key features of the deal and the way it has been drawn up.

“The EFL should not be patting themselves on the back thinking they have won and they should not see this as being done, because in fact, they have just started a war,” said the senior club figure opposed to the deal.

The new deal is a 35% increase on the previous contract in cash terms. It would see Championship sides each get £2.95m a year, up from the current £2.3m, but club chiefs believe that massively undervalues their product and point out the disparity with the Premier League where clubs receive a minimum of £100m per season.

And the new contract offers up a huge increase in televised games across all the Football League competitions.

The deal will give Sky 138 league matches a season as well as every play-off game and the Carabao Cup final.

They will also show 14 ties from the earlier rounds of the Carabao Cup and the semi-finals and final of the Checkatrade Trophy.

Crucially, it also involves an expansion of midweek action to fill the void where Sky have lost Champions League rights.

The new deal includes 16 fixtures on Tuesday and Wednesday evenings with an additional eight to be broadcast simultaneously on the red button on those nights - and that service is already having a marked impact on attendance.

Club chiefs are unhappy that red button games carry no fee and that so many were included in the deal without consultation.

The nine member board unanimously agreed the deal, including representatives of three Championship clubs, Reading, Brentford and Bristol City.

EFL chair Debbie Jevans said: “Concluding these negotiations has been challenging, as is the case when managing a diverse group of stakeholders, and the board took on board the comments and frustrations voiced by a number of clubs and has committed to reviewing the way the League engages with its clubs to ensure that we move forward in a collaborative way in the future.

“The deal we have entered into with Sky, after fully testing the current market through our external advisors, allows our clubs the benefit of financial security which was an absolute priority for us throughout this process,” added chief executive Shaun Harvey.