By Paul Nicholson
November 14 – FOX Sport in the US have renewed their Gold Cup TV deal with North, Central American and Caribbean confederation CONCACAF. The new deal secures them the rights to the 2017 and 2019 tournaments.
November 1 – Manchester City have continued their rapid digital expansion with the launch of a new app for Amazon Fire TV allowing users to stream CityTV videos directly on to a connected TV via the Amazon platform.
October 25 – The English FA has confirmed an £820 million six-season international broadcast rights deal for its FA Cup domestic competition, the oldest club competition in world football.
October 11 – FIFA has begun the sales process for the broadcast rights to the 2019 Women’s World Cup in France, launching an invitation to tender (ITT) for the UK media rights.
September 16 – German pay-TV sports network Sky Deutschland has announced it will add a new web channel that will focus on video content, skysport.de.
August 24 – Chinese broadcaster LeSports is testing the pay-per-view model on broadcasts of some of Italy’s Serie A matches in China.
August 22 – Thai broadcaster Bangkok Broadcasting & TV Co. (BBTV) has extended its deal with the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) for exclusive terrestrial broadcast rights from 2017 to 202 for AFC competitions.
August 16 – Manchester City is continuing to set the pace in the digital media space, with its latest move being a content deal with India’s VEQTA to broadcast content on its sports platform.
August 16 – MLS team LA Galaxy has signed a multi-year partnership with Virtual Reality firm Laduma to create original 360-degree 3D VR content experiences around the club and its star players.
August 12 – Will he stick to his promise? Halfway through last season, as Leicester City, 5000 to 1 outsiders at the start of the campaign, looked like they might win the English Premier League title, former England striker and BBC television presenter Gary Lineker boldly proclaimed that he would appear in his underpants at the start of this season’s campaign if his beloved Foxes somehow went go all the way.
By Paul Nicholson
August 9 – The Premier League has been cleared to continue its UK broadcast rights sales after regulator Ofcom closed an investigation into how live rights are sold and whether the auction system restricted or distorted competition.
August 9 – The opening of the Bundesliga 2 season in Germany has recorded strong viewing figures according to pay-TV broadcaster Sky. While football in general, ahead of the big league kick offs, is rating comparatively well against the Olympics that are taking place in Rio.
August 7 – La Liga, keen to boost its international broadcast profile and revenue, has issued guidelines and a warning to clubs that if their stadia are not seen to be 75% full on the television transmission they will fine their clubs.
By Paul Nicholson
August 3 – Any doubts that Facebook wasn’t preparing a major broadcast assault in the world’s biggest sport can be dispelled with the social media giant tonight making Premier League history with the streaming of a Wayne Rooney’s testimonial match.
August 2 – With the first round of Scotiabank Champions League fixtures kicking off the 2016-17 season tonight with Trinidad’s Central at home to Canada’s Vancouver Whitecaps and Mexico’s Pachuca at home to Honduras’ Olympia, CONCACAF has announced a significantly expanded Spanish-language TV deal in the US with Univision.