Analysis

Football

Overall Champions League rights fees in Italy have fallen about 10 per cent, after the Team Marketing agency concluded its sales.
Athletics

New domestic deals for two of Europe’s top five football leagues accounted for two of the three biggest television rights contracts signed in 2008.

American Football

Yes TV has begun rolling out its new US sport channel, All Sports Network, with this week’s carriage deal with PCCW’s Now TV platform in Hong Kong.
Football

Portuguese commercial broadcaster SIC arguably bid over the odds in the recent auction for Uefa’s Europa League television rights.
Football

Football: Japanese pay-broadcaster SkyPerfecTV acquired the communication-satellite (CS) rights for all 64 matches of the 2010 World Cup in a deal with the Dentsu agency
Athletics

Athletics: French pay-television operator Canal Plus will broadcast the new six-meeting Ligue national d’athlétisme after nuclear energy company Aveva stepped in with a new sponsorship deal.
Basketball

Basketball: Brazilian commercial broadcaster Globo is to acquire the rights for the new, top-flight domestic basketball league, Novo Basquete Brasil, for R$1.5m (€474,000/ $633,710) a season.
Football

Football: Philippines commercial broadcaster ABS-CBN acquired the rights for the 2010 World Cup in a $1m (€750,000) deal with the Football Media Services agency.
Athletics

Diminishing interest in athletics has resulted in the sport’s national governing body being forced to accept a significant reduction in rights fees in renewing its deal with public-service broadcaster the BBC.
Horse Racing

Channel Four’s decision to drop its coverage of the alpine skiing, snowboarding and Nordic World Cups has drawn strong criticism from both the sports and television production sectors.
Basketball

Leading Filipino commercial broadcaster ABS-CBN has struck a blow back at rival Solar Entertainment by winning the rights for the 2010 Fifa World Cup.
Football

Norwegian football’s top-tier domestic league, the Tippeliga, has turned down extra revenues from pay-television in order to give its internet partners more exclusivity.
Football

Telecinco’s deal for Uefa’s second-tier competition, the Europa League, is its biggest-ever investment in football rights, showing that even advertising-funded broadcasters are still willing to back sport despite the market slowdown.
Football

Italian state broadcaster Rai has become the only real bidder for free-to-air rights to top sport in the country, forcing down the value of rights even for major football competitions like the Uefa Champions League.
Cricket

A multi-million dollar deal for the Asian rights for international cricket in South Africa looks likely to become another victim of the economic crisis.
Rugby Union

European club competition the Heineken Cup last week became the third rugby union rights property in the last month to secure a healthy rise in rights fees from the UK television market.

Athletics

The court date set for this month that was to rule, once and for all, on the ownership of television rights to Spain’s football Liga has been postponed by at least six months, to next June or July.

The worsening global economy leaves the sports television industry nervously tightening its belt at the end of what has been a momentous year.