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The government has revealed a shake up of TV rights for domestic football competitions, with matches involving the biggest clubs to be shown exclusively on private channels.
Games for four clubs – Boca Juniors, River Plate, Racing, and Independiente – will be televised by Canal 13 and Telefé, channels owned by media conglomerate Grupo Clarín and telecommunications company Telefónica, respectively.
The rights to Nacional B (second division), Copa Argentina (Argentine Cup) will be returned to the Argentina Football Association. Those matches are set to be shown on TyC Sports, another channel owned by Clarín.
The remaining fixtures will continue to be shown on Fútbol Para Todos (FPT), the state TV programme set up in 2009 by Cristina Fernández de Kirchner to guarantee universal access to domestic football.
The new director of FPT, Fernando Marín agreed to hand over rights to both Canal 13 and Telefé in exchange for an estimated $180m, around 10% of the total budget for the programme in 2016.
President Mauricio Macri has said that he wished to continue with Fútbol Para Todos but by “lowering production costs, without showing political advertisements so that football returns to being a place for all Argentines”. Historically, members of Macri’s PRO party had previously observed Fútbol Para Todos to be costly and partisan, especially in the lead up to the elections. Jujuy Governor Geraldo Morales once deemed it ‘shameless’.
However, some have criticised the change to the rights. Popular Uruguayan sports journalist Víctor Hugo Morales believes that by only paying 10% of the fees, Clarín and Telefónica are to reap the far ranging financial gains through private advertisement, whilst the state does not gain anything.
Paulo Vilouta, journalist at América TV, pointed out that the new situation will be detrimental to competition within the television market.
Another concern is that the deal will restrict viewers’ access to key league games. Though Telefé and Canal 13 are free-to-air channels, they are not available in all parts of the country, leading to fears that people outside of Buenos Aires will be unable to watch matches involving the four clubs without a cable subscription.
However, a source from Fútbol Para Todos spoke to La Nacion to declare ‘In those places of the country where there is no possibility to televise, Telefé and Canal 13 games will be broadcast on Public TV in retrospect, thereby ensuring national coverage and the free coverage of games’.
Out of the other two channels reportedly involved in negotiations, channel 9 decided it did not wish to wade in on the financial debate and declared it was happy to televise the Paquete de Sábados (Saturday football package), which tends to receive lower audience figures. America TV is set to submit an appeal alleging the sale of the rights was not publicly tendered.
The post Telefónica, Clarín Gain in Shake Up of Football TV Rights appeared first on The Argentina Independent.
