In the 1960s, a '3pm blackout' was proposed to the English Football League by then-Burnley chairman Bob Lord.
He argued that televising matches on a Saturday afternoon would discourage fans from attending games which, in turn, would have negative impact of football club's main source of income. It took a global pandemic over fifty years later for the blackout to be lifted.
Thanks to 'Project Restart', Brighton & Hove Albion against Arsenal became the first football match broadcast live between 2:45pm and 5:15pm on a Saturday afternoon since the blackout was first introduced.
But surely now a debate should be had over how prevalent Bob Lord's reasoning is in 2020? If broadcasting matches at 3pm on a Saturday discourages attendance, then why is this not the case for Friday nights, Saturday morning, Saturday evenings, Saturday nights, Sunday afternoons etc?
Over the years, the restrictions have led to what is described as a 'grey' market with many fans choosing to catch the action using online streams from broadcasters around the world where the blackout doesn't exist.
And if the market is grey, so too are the rules that surround it. Both Sky and the Premier League agree that watching such streams is not illegal on the part of the viewer, it is for establishments that choose to broadcast them.
However, an increasing number of examples are now available where publicans have challenged the legality of their fines and had them subsequently thrown out by the Crown Court.
Heading into the 2020/21 season, the blackout has once again been lifted until the full return of fans in stadiums. A final decision will be made next week on whether all behind-closed-door matches will again be televised.
This, coupled with the Premier League's decision to cancel their estimated £526m TV deal in China has led many to speculate that the groundwork may be being laid for a Netflix-style subscription service.
It was a solution was proposed late last year by former Crystal Palace chairman Simon Jordan.
Speaking on talkSPORT, Jordan said: "If you brought in a 'Netflix of football', [you'd get] 100million subscribers around the world paying £9 a month because no one would be able to resist that price point."
"You’d bring in £11billion every year rather than £8.1billion every three years."
The current packages sold to Sky Sports, BT Sport and now Amazon run through until the end of the 2021/22 season.
Whether they will be the last of their kind remains to be seen, but have recent circumstances hurried an inevitability along? Is it time to lift the 3pm blackout for good?
