A chastened Setanta Sports is to review its decision to keep the highlights of away England and Scotland World Cup qualifying matches to itself. The pay-television broadcaster plans to clarify its policy before England's match against Belarus on October 15 and it is expected to decide that highlights should be aired free of charge.

Setanta decided only two hours before Wednesday's kick-off that it would show highlights of England's game with Croatia and Scotland's match against Iceland on a free-to-air basis, using its channels.

However, Setanta's concession came so late that few supporters knew it was possible to watch the highlights free. As a result, while Setanta was able to celebrate a record 1.4million audience for the live match, the highlights attracted a derisory 220,000.

The company also had to endure “We hate Setanta” chants from England fans in Zagreb, although it will have secured extra subscriptions from people who decided at the last minute to see the match. Setanta would not specify how many signed up to one of its packages that cost up to £12.99 a month. To add to the humiliation, Setanta agreed to sell a highlights package to ITV a day late yesterday.

ITV is understood to have paid £100,000 for the chance to show Theo Walcott's hat-trick in the 4-1 victory in Zagreb, a day after it emerged that Setanta had turned down an offer of £500,000 to show highlights on the night of the match.

Setanta insiders acknowledge that they had made a mistake by allowing negotiations with ITV and other broadcasters to run up to the wire, in the hope of securing £1million. When the money did not materialise, Setanta did not have enough time to implement its plan B.

Two options are under consideration. Setanta will try to strike a highlights deal with a broadcaster long before the Belarus game, most likely with ITV, which has the rights to transmit England's home qualifying matches live. Yesterday, Setanta said that it hopes “to make another announcement shortly”.

However, Setanta officials will also impose a deadline, a few days before the tie, and if it has not been able to achieve its reserve price, it will make the game available on one of its channels.

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