Frank Dunne

The senior management of Ufa Sports supported the sale of the agency to Lagardère Unlimited on the understanding that Lagardère has ambitions to become a major force in the sports-rights market once again, TV Sports Markets understands.

Marco Bianchi, president of the B4 Capital agency, this week told TV Sports Markets that his company’s aggressive bid to win the international rights to Italy’s Coppa Italia and Supercoppa showed that Italian football was far healthier than some critics have suggested.

The annual congress of the Asian Football Confederation, which took place this week in Bahrain, was ostensibly a political event - but a whole range of media-rights issues were under discussion.

Andrea Radrizzani, one of the founders of the MP & Silva agency, is set to launch his own football channels under the Eleven brand. It had long been anticipated that Radrizzani would create his own business outside the agency, but the nature of the project has surprised many in the industry.

UK pay-television operator BT will maintain its investment in England’s Football Conference, the tier below the Football League.

The rights-trading subsidiaries of sports marketing company Lagardère Unlimited look set for a double boost. World Sport Group is close to renewing its contract with the Asian confederation, while Sportfive remains favourite to renew its deal for African confederation rights.

Italian state broadcaster Rai is the strong favourite to land the rights for Euro 2016, which were put out to tender this week, and is expected to do so at a substantial discount.

Fifa’s 2014 accounts, published last week, confirmed that the governing body’s deal with the Infront Sports & Media agency and advertising agency Dentsu for the World Cup rights in Asia was an exceptionally profitable one for the two agencies.

The majority of sports bodies – those below the very top tier – are expected to find it very difficult to secure decent rights fees from the UK for many years to come as a direct result of the spiralling price inflation for Premier League rights.

Fifa avoided the prospect of going back into a US court by agreeing to extend its World Cup rights deal with Rupert Murdoch’s Fox Sports last month. But getting off the legal hook comes at a price, in terms of questions about Fifa’s governance and also, possibly, in having sold the rights at well below market value.