Europe

International sports broadcaster Eleven Sports Network has sealed a carriage deal for its channels in Poland with cable-television operator INEA.

Servus TV, the German commercial broadcaster owned by energy drinks brand Red Bull, has acquired rights in Austria for the MotoGP motorcycling championship.

French pay-television broadcaster Canal Plus has acquired exclusive rights for the basketball qualifying tournaments ahead of the 2016 summer Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

French public-service broadcaster France Télévisions has acquired rights for the men’s Davis Cup and women’s Fed Cup national team tennis tournaments.

The QYOU, a curator of internet video content for subscription-television services, has sealed a partnership with Dutch cable-television operator Ziggo.

UK public-service broadcaster the BBC and commercial broadcaster ITV have announced their split of matches for the upcoming 2016 Six Nations Championship, which features the national rugby union teams of England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, France and Italy.

French public-service broadcaster France Télévisions has struck a deal to show coverage of the latter stages of the 2016 men’s and women’s European Handball Championships.

Meo, the Portuguese pay-television operator owned by telecommunications company Altice, has acquired rights for the home matches of the country’s Primeira Liga top-tier football club Rio Ave.

The Comisión Nacional de los Mercados y La Competencia (CNMC), Spain’s competition regulator, has ruled that LaLiga must provide a 90-second summary of every game from the top division of domestic football and allow free access to stadiums for broadcasters.

Russian sports media platform Match TV is set to launch a number of new television channels, along with closing or renaming other channels within its structure.

Rona Fairhead, the chair of the BBC Trust, has said it is likely that the UK public-service broadcaster will introduce further cutbacks on its sports coverage in order to save costs.

Polish media and telecommunications group Cyfrowy Polsat, its television channel Polsat Sport and media company Grupa Onet – Ringier Axel Springer Polska have entered into an exclusive distribution agreement for sports content.

Italian pay-television broadcaster Sky Italia and the Mediaset media company have been accused by the country’s antitrust authority, the AGCM, of violating competition law by dividing up rights to domestic football’s Serie A top division and excluding new entrants, according to a report by Sunday newspaper La Repubblica.

The French Cycling Federation (FFC) has awarded rights in France to public-service broadcaster France Télévisions and the Eurosport France division of pan-European sports broadcaster Eurosport.

Channel 5 has replaced fellow commercial broadcaster ITV as a rights partner of the World Rally Championship in the UK, while pay-television broadcaster BT Sport and Welsh public-service television channel S4C have extended their deals with the motor racing series.

The European Hockey Federation has launched a live streaming initiative which will commence with the start of its EuroHockey Indoor Championships events today (Friday).