IMG MEDIA RENEW FOOTBALL LEAGUE TELEVISION RIGHTS CONTRACT

In a multi-million pound deal, The Football League announced today that it will be renewing its contract with the global sports and entertainment company IMG, for the worldwide distribution rights (excluding Africa and Middle East) of all Football League and Carling Cup matches, in a three year deal beginning 2009/10.

For the first time, The Football League has split its worldwide rights across a number of different partners.  The new agreements will see four different broadcasters and agencies holding the rights to show Football League and Carling Cup matches in Africa and the Middle East, whilst IMG Media will market The Football League’s overseas television rights to the rest of the globe.
 
In total, The Football League will have 6 overseas broadcasting partners from August 2009 and domestic rights, which were announced earlier this season, will remain with Sky Sports and BBC Sport. 
 
In announcing The League’s new overseas broadcasting arrangements Football League Chairman Lord Mawhinney said:
 
“The Football League prides itself on producing some of the most competitive and exciting league and cup football in the world game. 
 
“These arrangements, which reflect a huge increase in resources for our clubs, demonstrate that the global football audience is increasingly recognising this too.
 
“I would like to welcome all our new broadcasting partners to working with The League and its clubs.”
 
Chris Guinness, IMG Media - Senior Vice President of New Business & Acquisitions, said:
 
“I am absolutely delighted, in an increasingly competitive environment for Football rights this is an extremely important renewal.
 
By the end of the next term IMG Media, through it’s acquisition of CSI Sports, will have represented the Football League for 20 years, which is something to be very proud of”.

About IMG Sports Media
IMG Sports Media, the sports production and distribution division of IMG Worldwide, is the world’s largest independent producer and distributor of sports programming.  IMG Sports Media produces more than 8,000 hours of television, online, mobile and radio sports content across 240 categories of sports, including golf, football (soccer), tennis, cricket, cycling, motor sports and mixed martial arts.  IMG Sports Media also represents the broadcast rights to many of the world’s premier sporting events and maintains the world’s largest sports archive with more than 250,000 hours of footage.