Spanish media rights and production agency Mediapro has agreed to a further €1.1m ($1.2m) contribution to women’s football in Spain in order to ensure that salary contributions are met.
The agreement covers 11 of the 16 top-tier Primera Iberdrola teams, who will each receive an additional €100,000 that will enable them to comply with salary demands. The Association of Women’s Football Clubs (ACFF) said that the new contribution would facilitate a collective bargaining agreement for the women’s game.
The announcement raising Mediapro’s contribution €2.6m comes after it had already pledged €1.5m in late 2019 after the ACFF threatened strike action over proposed minimum wage increases and demands to basic working rights.
Mediapro acquired the Primera Iberdrola rights to broadcast up to four matches per matchday. It holds the first, fourth, sixth and seventh picks from each matchday.
Two of those matches are exploited on Mediapro’s free-to-air channel Gol, with two shown on the Vamos channel of Telefónica-owned pay-television broadcaster Movistar+ as per a sublicensing agreement between the two parties.
Three clubs – Athletic Club (also known as Athletic Bilbao), Real Madrid and Barcelona – have simulcast their matches on the club’s own channels.
Mediapro initially agreed a collective rights agreement with 12 of the league’s 16 clubs after the rights were tendered for the first time in the league’s history. That deal was worth €3m per season from 2019-20 to 2021-22 but excluded Barcelona, Athletic Club, Sevilla and Tacón.
Proposals from the RFEF and Mediapro came amid calls from the Association of Spanish Footballers (AFE), which included a minimum gross salary of €20,000 per year, alongside basic rights such as 30 days of holiday leave, a maternity leave policy and a framework to legislate for injuries.
Meanwhile, pay-television broadcaster DirecTV has agreed a deal to broadcast the knockout stages of the Spanish Copa de la Reina tournament across Latin America.
The rights will be exploited on DirecTV’s linear DirecTV Sports channel and on streaming platforms via the DirecTV Sports app, DirecTVSports.com and its OTT platform DirecTV Go.
DirecTV’s deal began from the round-of-16 stage on February 11 and it will also broadcast the quarter-finals, semi-finals and final, which is played on May 31.
ESPN Brasil also recently announced a deal to broadcast the Copa de la Reina in Brazil (along with other RFEF properties).