PUBS will continue showing live Saturday afternoon soccer, despite claims that Premier League spies are closing in on 'copyright breaking' licensees.

League lawyers are said to have launched a series of covert raids to gain evidence against landlords who show games picked up from a Norwegian satellite.

But today, Whitbread, who have installed the necessary equipment in nine of their East Lancashire outlets, vowed to continue the service.

Whitbread Inns' regional director for the North West Mr Norman Jepson, said the company was confident it was operating within the law.

He added: "The legal advice is that we are doing nothing wrong.

"The service has been very popular, probably because football is such an important part of life in the North West."

The Premier League allow Norway's Norsk TV 2 channel to show live Saturday games. But commercial deals with Sky, the BBC and ITV prevent live Saturday broadcasts within the UK.

Norsk TV 2 shows a top British game every week which is in turn shown in pubs with the necessary satellite dish and decoding equipment. However, Premiership bosses fear huge financial implications if they lose control of the right to sell exlusivity to TV companies, especially in the run-up to the launch of pay-per-view television.

And they have hired copyright experts Denton Hall, whose junior lawyers have secretly entered bars in Manchester.

A Premier League spokesman said: "These games are being shown in breach of our copyright. We sell Sky the exclusive right to show live football matches, but prevent broadcasts of live Saturday games in the UK because it would be damaging to the game."

However, Mr Graham James, of the Sat Com company which supplies the equipment, said: "I don't know how they can say that these pubs are infringing copyright.

"The signals are not pinched from grounds or the BBC, they are picked up from the Norwegian satellite.

"Norway is not in the European Community so there can be no breach of copyright."

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