Broadcasting rights has ever been a big issue ahead of any important soccer international event; we saw how FIFA had to use its teeth to force official world cup broadcasters to provide the live coverage across the world at reasonable cost recently. Now, the same problem seems to be heading again, yes we are talking about EURO 2016 which is two years head yet created lots of headlines for apparent hike in the broadcasting fee by the CAA Eleven the exclusive UEFA agent to manage the centralized commercial rights of all UEFA events including distributing rights of live coverage of this year’s finals and qualifiers. This is probably be the first time, UEFA has taken the help of professional media selling agent to gain a maximum amount out of possible deals with various regions, but here is a problem, Russia the host of next world cup has raised its strong objection over the fee UEFA agent is asking to pay and said it is way too high in comparison to the EURO 2012, in fact, problem has crossed the sports barrier and taken a political shape when sports minister Vitaly Mutko himself intervened into the matter.
The sendoff continues since last few weeks, but now after a political intervention, it is expected to see some middle way to enable Russian fans to watch their favorite European tourney live across the nation. As far qualifiers are concerned, reportedly, Rossija-1 is going to broadcast all the away games of Russian national team except the match with Austria on 15 November. Mutko discussed the problem in his recent interview where he talked about how CAA Eleven is forcing every football federation to pay piles of money to catch the live coverage of this year’s qualifiers along with final, and if problem is so serious two years ahead, imagine what would happen in 2016.
He said, “I, like many other fans, was concerned that until now, it was not agreed regarding broadcasting the EURO 2016 matches on Russian television. This is related to commercial side of the deal. UEFA has a new partner, who put certain financial conditions to national football federations. This year, the qualifying matches for EURO 2016 and the final match is one TV product. This partner wants to earn a lot from the outset and put a price much higher than usual. Our channels do not want to pay such money for football.
“There are serious negotiations right now. We know how expensive are the TV rights for showing football in Europe. In Russia, this sport has a completely different cost. The company that is selling the rights does not want to look into our situation and lower the cost. I will find out about the status of the negotiations and will try to facilitate their successful completion. We need to show the Euro matches.”