Trio of Mexican broadcasters land Chivas rights for 2020 Clausura

Mexican Liga MX football team Club Deportivo Guadalajara (Chivas) has agreed rights deals with commercial broadcasters TV Azteca, Televisa and Multimedios for its 2020 Clausura campaign, but has reportedly been forced to accept a smaller fee than what it had sought.

The three broadcasters, alongside the club’s in-house channel Chivas TV, will share rights to the Chivas home matches from the winter season of the Liga MX campaign.

Chivas had been seeking $45m (€40.2m) for a year-long rights deal, according to the Mexican newspaper Reforma, but has instead been forced to settle for $10m as a combined payment for the six months covering the Clausura season.

Rights in the US market have not yet been awarded.

TDN, a pay-television channel of Televisa, held the rights to Chivas matches through to the end of 2019.

At the start of 2019, Chivas agreed a one-year, non-exclusive, free-to-air media-rights deal with Televisa covering all its home matches in Liga MX and the Copa MX, with Televisa paying no rights fee.

The deal, which covered the 2019 Clausura and the 2019 Apertura, fended off the threat of legal action from Televisa after Chivas signed a one-season deal with rival TV Azteca, covering 2019.

In each calendar year, Liga MX has an Apertura season, which is played in the summer, and a Clausura season, played in the winter.