Greece

Greek commercial broadcaster Alpha is pulling out of its commitments to domestic football.

Football: Greek public-service broadcaster ERT, commercial broadcaster Mega and triple-play operator On Telecoms acquired packages of Champions League rights for the three-year period from 2009-10 to 2011-12.

Greek telecoms company Forthnet, owner of the country’s leading pay broadcaster Nova, is facing its biggest challenge yet after rival telecoms companies last week acquired sports rights for the first time, much earlier than anticipated.

Football: The African Union of Broadcasters signed a deal with Fifa for the English, French and Portuguese-language television and radio rights to the 2010 World Cup.

Greek football’s top-tier Superleague finally approved a new collectively-negotiated television rights deal, albeit without the two clubs presently top of the league table.

Forthcoming negotiations for the domestic rights for English rugby union’s Guinness Premiership will act as an interesting barometer of the state of the UK sports rights market, three months before the start of football’s Premier League rights talks.