Better known for covering news in the Middle East, Al Jazeera has recently expanded aggressively in French football rights, prompting speculation it wanted to cross the Channel to muscle in on the Premier League.
The outcome of the looming contest will be deeply significant for the bidders and for the Premier League's member clubs, who have reaped millions of pounds from the sale of rights to broadcast their top stars in action.
BSkyB has had the lion's share of domestic Premier League rights since the competition was launched two decades ago, the two enjoying what one former Sky executive called "one of the great corporate romances of our time".
"The Premier League needs the market to think that Al Jazeera is coming in order to make others bid higher," said Simon Johnson, a consultant with the Sports & Media Group at lawyers Charles Russell.
"Al Jazeera are ambitious, wealthy and acquisitive, but as of now they have concentrated all their efforts on buying rights in France," he said.
"Like many around the world, we're fans of the Premier League and would love to continue bringing it to fans in the UK as we do in many countries around the world," said an ESPN spokesman. "We're awaiting details of the rights tender and look forward to participating in the process."
Sky Deutschland, which like BSkyB is part-owned by Rupert Murdoch's News Corp, spent heavily last week to retain live rights to German football.
"The specifics of the German broadcast market are different to the UK market. What the German auction did show was the continued importance of top flight football to pay TV operators," said Austin Houlihan, a senior consultant in the sports business group at Deloitte.
