Tina Kandelaki, the general producer of Match TV, has said that the Russian privately-held broadcaster has agreed a deal to show the 2017 Fifa Confederations Cup and the 2018 World Cup national team football tournaments.
Last week, Russian newspaper Sport-Express reported that Match TV and national state-controlled commercial broadcaster Channel One had secured rights to the competition, both of which will to take place in the country. However, the deal has not been officially announced yet.
Kandelaki told the Tass news agency: “The agreement has been reached and you will soon find out about the details. Match TV will be broadcasting the matches of the World Cup and the Confederations Cup. The negotiations took some time, but this is a standard process.”
Last month Gazprom-Media chief executive Dmitry Chernyshenko said that Russian broadcasters had put forward a “unified proposal” to Fifa, football’s global governing body. Russia’s largest media holding group owns Match TV.
Sport-Express said the deal is worth $36m (€32m) in total, with the Confederations Cup section accounting for $4.5m of the fee.