The Mediapro agency is disputing a claim by Spanish commercial broadcaster Telecinco last week that it had acquired two of Spain’s away qualifiers – against the Czech Republic and Lithuania. Telecinco bought the rights from the B4 agency, which in turn had sublicensed the rights from Sportfive.
But a senior executive at Mediapro told TV Sports Markets that “The rights for these matches belong to us as part of our long-term agreement with Sportfive to represent their rights in Spain. We don’t know on what basis Telecinco pretends to have these rights.”
Another row is brewing over Sportfive’s sale of one of the three France away qualifiers sold to French commercial broadcaster M6, Bosnia-France. The deal went ahead despite Kentaro already having notified French broadcasters that it had a legitimate contract with the Bosnian federation.
Kentaro says that it will also sell the game into France. “We are also very confident that we can deliver the television signal to our broadcast partner exclusively and that we can protect this exclusivity,” said agency co-founder Philipp Grothe.
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