February 6 – Sports broadcaster beIN SPORTS is to take further legal action in its dispute with US cable operator Comcast over its rights to have carriage on the Comacast platform.
January 11 – Matches from the second tier of Spanish football are to be broadcast on Youtube with English commentary in a bid to boost the division’s international appeal.
December 21 – A record audience of more than 3.5 billion people watched this year’s World Cup in Russia, with the final between France and Croatia attracting 1.12 billion viewers, according to FIFA.
November 15 – Scottish football has secured a second key TV rights deal following on from news last week that the SPFL was closing in on a £100 million three-year deal with Sky.
November 9 – FIFA has extended its broadcast rights deal with the European Broadcast Union (EBU) for a package of events, including the France 2019 Women’s World Cup, for a new four-year period through to 2020
November 7 – Netflix might finally have understood what it means to be a football fan. Rather than another sycophantic love-in with one of the world’s big money club, the producer-come-streaming service has invested in the far grittier story of Sunderland’s disastrous fall from grace into the third tier of English football.
By Andrew Warshaw
October 15 – UEFA has firmly denied reports that it has banned Israel’s public broadcaster, Kan, from televising qualifying games in the disputed occupied territories.
August 22 – The English Football League (EFL) is halfway through its first midweek round of EFL fixtures to be streamed in the UK and Ireland. 31 games across the Sky Bet Championship, Sky Bet League One and Sky Bet League Two will have been live-streamed by the end of tonight’s matches.
By Paul Nicholson
August 10 – Qatar-owned sports broadcaster beIN SPORTS has renewed its exclusive Premier League broadcast rights deal for a further three years starting from the 2019/20 season. beIN’s rights will cover the Middle East and North Africa.
July 6 – The entry of the giant OTT streaming services into the top tier football rights market is gathering pace with Facebook agreeing an estimated £260 million deal for live Premier League matches in south-east Asia.
February 28 – CONCACAF, who on Monday announced an expansion of their blue riband Gold Cup national team tournament, have followed up with the unveiling of a multi-platform digital media rights deal with Verizon for all its competitions.
By Andrew Warshaw
February 14 – The bubble hasn’t exactly burst for domestic rights to show Premier League games but maybe a ceiling has been hit in terms of the value of matches.
January 24 – Sports broadcaster Eleven Sports secured exclusive TV rights in Belgium for a host of major international matches, reasserting its market position in the Belgian TV landscape.
July 4 – Nearly half of Premier League fans have at some stage streamed a top-flight game online through an unauthorised provider, according to a survey conducted by the BBC.
June 21 – Telemundo is reporting record broadcast numbers on its digital platforms for its coverage of the Confederations Cup 2017 from Russia. Nielsen ratings report that the Portugal vs. Mexico reached 4 million total viewers on Telemundo and ranks as the most streamed match ever on Telemundo’s digital platforms.