ESPN has acquired multimedia rights to football’s NextGen Series, a six month European competition featuring the future stars of football.

The series, which is in all but name an Under-19 Champions League competition, will showcase the best young talent from 24 of Europe’s top clubs, including Premier League champions Manchester City, La Liga giants Barcelona, Scudetto winners Juventus and big-spending French club PSG.

ESPN starts its coverage of NextGen with Inter Milan vs Borussia Dortmund on September 26, with exclusivity to the series in the United States, Brazil, Latin America, the Caribbean, Oceania and the Middle East.

In all, ESPN International will telecast 18 matches on its television networks around the world this season, including the semi-finals and final. All NextGen matches will also be carried live on ESPN’s broadband platforms ESPNPlay.com (the Caribbean and Latin America), WatchESPN (Brazil) and ESPN3.com (the Middle East and Oceania).

“The NextGen Series is a tremendous showcase for young talent developing at Europe’s top football clubs,” Mike Walters, vice president of programming at ESPN International, said. “In addition to getting a forecast of who may shine in Europe’s top leagues and the UEFA Champions League in the near future, fans will get a first look at future internationals who may lead their countries at World Cup 2014 and Euro 2016.”

Justin Andrews, co-founder of NextGen said: “We’re delighted to be introducing NextGen to so many new territories outside Europe, and via such a great broadcaster. There is a clear appetite for NextGen across the globe, giving fans the chance to follow the future stars of football.”

 

The double Champions League exit by Manchester United and Manchester City might not be as damaging to Manchester’s economy as first thought, in fact it might have a positive effect, tourism chiefs have said.

United and City were both knocked out of Europe’s premier competition last night in what is being branded as black Wednesday.

Both will now both take part in the less glamorous Europa League instead.

But while Old Trafford and Etihad officials will be counting the cost as the Europa League’s prize money is dwarfed by that on offer by its bigger sister, the double defeat could open the doors to a whole new market for Manchester’s tourism trade, analysts say.

The Reds and Blues, if they avoid each other and their fellow Premier League clubs left in the competition, will be up against lesser-known European clubs whose fans may seize the opportunity of a rare trip to Manchester.

And with City now favourites and United second favourites to lift the trophy both will expect to enjoy an extended stay in the competition.

Brian Sloan, chief economist at Greater Manchester Chamber of Commerce, said: “The average European football fan spends £776 ($1,213) in the city according to data from Visit Manchester and I would not expect that to change for fans of teams in the Europa League.

“Perhaps supporters of some of Europe’s clubs will seize the opportunity to come to Manchester as they have never been before and don’t know when they will get the chance to come again.

“It could actually have a positive effect on the city’s economy.

“It’s is obviously really disappointing that both of the city’s clubs are no longer in the Champions League and they will lose out because of the decrease in prize money.

“It’s devastating for fans and they will miss out on the benefits of being in such a high profile competition.

“But it could have a positive impact on the numbers of visitors.”

The Perform group have agreed a deal with DFL Sports Enterprises, the worldwide sales and distribution arm of the DFL, to market and distribute live and highlights coverage of the Bundesliga 2012/13 season across digital platforms in Italy.

The partnership will see the DFL adopt an innovative new distribution model that will include streaming one live match per week for free across leading news publisher websites and sports portals, as well as Perform’s football website Goal.com, which reaches 1.6m fans in Italy per month. 

In addition to the live streaming, DFL will also distribute highlight clips via a Bundesliga channel on Perform’s sports VOD broadcast platform ePlayer, which reaches 8m fans in Italy and sits on all the leading publisher sites and portals, as well as on LG and Toshiba connected TVs via Perform’s LIVESPORT.TV application.

As part of the partnership, Perform will sell the advertising and sponsorship inventory across all of the live and on demand Bundesliga content in Italy. 
Kay Dammholz, Vice President Sales Audiovisual Rights at DFL Sports Enterprise commented: “In cooperation with Perform and their Italian media partners we are confident to deliver a top football offering to the numerous Bundesliga fans in Italy. Furthermore we expect to draw major learnings from this pilot project for possible further future activities in the digital field.” 

Jacopo Tonoli, Managing Director of Perform in Southern Europe added: “This is the first time a major football competition like the Bundesliga has adopted such an exciting distribution strategy. It is one of the world’s leading club football competitions and we are excited to be able to use our market leading products and partners to ensure fans of the Bundesliga can stay in touch with all the news and action.”

Manchester City boss, Roberto Mancini, has blasted Bayern Munich’s persistent criticism of City’s spending leading them to breaking financial fair-play regulations.

Bayern CEO Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, 56, has been one of City’s more outspoken critics, along with the Bayern president, Uli Hoeness, and the German club’s honorary president, Franz Beckenbauer, because of the problems at the Etihad Stadium when it comes to Uefa’s financial fair-play regulations.

Rummenigge played for a decade at Bayern from 1974, winning 95 Germany caps and in an interview he urged UEFA to enforce ‘strict penalties’ on City for breaking the rules.

Mancini said: “I don’t understand his behaviour. We’re working hard with the financial rules. There are other clubs with financial fair play play problems not just City.”

With Uefa’s financial fair play rules being implemented from next season, all clubs taking part in European competitions will have to break even by 2014.

And Mancini added: “I don’t know why an important man like him, from a big club, and a great player, keeps talking about us. I want to ask him after the game.

“I think everybody is worried about Manchester City becoming one of the great clubs. But why is he always talking about us?”

Mancini was also unhappy with Aurelio De Laurentiis’s recent criticisms of City, when the Napoli president and notoriously outspoken film-maker predicted that Sheikh Mansour and his Abu Dhabi United Group would become bored and look for another “toy.”

“Fortunately, Sheikh Mansour is not Italian,” Mancini said. “He [De Laurentiis] doesn’t know Sheik Mansour. Sheikh Mansour is a good man and we can’t think about these stupid comments.”

Singtel in Singapore have been awarded media rights for the 2012–15 UEFA Champions League and UEFA Europa League.

Pay television operator Singtel will broadcast two live UEFA Champions League fixtures each matchnight on its channels Mio Sports 1 and Mio Sports 2, viagra as well as a highlights programme to be shown at prime time each matchweek on Mio Sports 1.

In terms of the UEFA Europa League, each matchweek Mio Sports 1 will broadcast one live game per kick-off slot and a highlights programme at prime time.

All rights have been granted on a platform-neutral basis, with the rights also being exploited on the internet as well as on mobile.

Michel Platini, sales the president of European soccer’s governing body UEFA, has said he would be happy to reschedule his continent’s club schedule to allow the 2022 World Cup in Qatar to be played in the winter.

Platini is considering the change as matches in the summer in Qatar would come under sweltering summer temperatures and would subsequently be unfair on players and spectators.

“We have to think about everybody, what would be better for the World Cup in Qatar,” Platini said in an interview with Al-Jazeera on Friday. “How you can bring the people and say you will go in June (to) Qatar when it’s 50 degrees?

“The people, they come (for) three weeks or two weeks with 60 degrees, they (would) never go outside the hotel. It (is) not correct.”

Not only would playing the World Cup in the winter involve moving the dates of the Champions League and Europa League — UEFA’s club competitions — it would also forced European leagues to change their schedules.

However, Platini said the World Cup “is the best moment in football.”

“I think we have to adapt (to) when is the best moment and where is the best moment to play this World Cup in Qatar,” the former French forward said.

Qatar beat the United States, Australia, Japan and South Korea for the right to stage the 2022 tournament and will become the smallest country to host the World Cup.

“For me, I voted for Qatar because I think it (is) nice to go to another part of the world, with people who never received the World Cup,” said Platini, who could succeed Sepp Blatter as FIFA president in 2015. “They lost five times with Morocco, with Egypt. And I think it was nice to come to Russia in Europe (in 2018). They’ve never received (the World Cup) in the east of Europe.”

Mixed martial arts promotion, Super Fight League has brought in a broadcast partner along with a new brand ambassador. 

Neo Prime, the all sports channel from Neo Sports Broadcast stable, has entered into a long-term deal with SFL to promote the sport. The sports broadcaster will also televise newly launched Friday Fight Nights, which will kick-off 12 October.

The Friday Fight Night has been launched to provide fighters from India and the world a platform to showcase their skills. To be staged in a specially designed arena in Mumbai, the weekly fight nights will last three hours with weigh-ins, live fights, and interviews from Bollywood cage side guests.

The entry to the Friday Fight Nights will be on invitation basis and through contests on social media.

The first season of the SFL was broadcast on general entertainmentchannel Colors which had acquired the rights to the property as part of its experimentation with the sports entertainment concept.

SFL has also appointed Olympics bronze medal winning boxer Mary Kom as brand ambassador.

“We have invested more than Rs 25 crores (Rs 250 million) till now in the property and have earmarked Rs 100 crores (Rs 1 billion) for the venture,” SFL Founder Chairman Raj Kundra told reporters during a press conference to announce the fight night.

“The Friday Fight Night is an exciting proposition giving a right mix of sport and entertainment to audiences,” said Neo Sports Broadcast COO Prasana Krishnan.

SFL’s Friday Fight Night will also be available on SFL dedicated channel on YouTube as it seeks to expand its reach to global markets. The SFL promoters have also entered into strategic alliance with Invicta Fighting Championships to develop women’s MMA talent in India.

The BBC & Rugby Football League (RFL) have agreed a broadcast deal for live coverage of all four matches in the triangular tournament featuring England, France and Wales.

The announcement is a throwback to the days of BBC’s Grandstand programme, which regularly screened live coverage of Saturday afternoon rugby league before the arrival of satellite company Sky, whose Saturday evening kick-offs have been a feature of the recent Tri and Four Nations Series.

The Four Nations has gone into cold storage until after the 2013 World Cup and, with Sky declining to cover the triangular tournament, the BBC have stepped in to secure the rights.

The competition kicks off in the northern French city of Lens on Saturday, October 20 when France host Wales, before moving on to Wrexham on Saturday, October 27 (2.30pm) for Wales’ game against England.

Broadcaster Nelonen has been awarded 2012–15 UEFA Europa League media rights in Finland.

Nelonen will broadcast one live match per kick-off slot on Nelonen Pro 1 and Nelonen Pro 2, followed by a highlights programme on Nelonen Pro 1. The UEFA Europa League Final will be broadcast via one of Nelonen’s free-to-air channels.

All rights have been granted on a platform-neutral basis, with the rights also being exploited on the internet via www.nelonenpro.fi as well as on mobile.

The Premier League has revealed the Agent fees each club has paid annually with an overall increase and Manchester City spending the most at a staggering £9.663 million ($15.18m), 13% of the overall total.

Manchester City spent £2m ($3.1m) more than its nearest rival Tottenham who spent £7.57m ($11.9m) from Oct. 1, 2010, to Sept. 30, 2011, a period that covers two transfer windows. City’s total is close to three times the average spent per team — £3.6m ($5.7m).

The Abu Dhabi-owned club, which leads the Premier League by five points from defending champion Manchester United, bought players including Argentina forward Sergio Aguero, France midfielder Samir Nasri and Bosnia-Herzegovina striker Edin Dzeko.

It was a big increase on the £6 million ($9.2 million) City spent over the previous 12 months, but still less than the £12.9 million ($21.3 million) it shelled out from Oct. 1, 2008-Sept. 30, 2009.

Total spending by Premier League clubs was up 7 per cent on the 67.1 million (then $104.8 million) from the previous 12 months. There were 765 player transfers, 23 more than for the previous 12 months.

Liverpool was third with £7 million ($11 million), followed by Chelsea and Newcastle.

Manchester United was seventh with 4.5 million pounds ($7.1 million). Newly promoted Swansea spent the least with just £248,633 on fees.