beIN SPORT has acquired the TV and Internet rights to England’s Capital One Cup tournament as well as Football League Championship.

Beginning with the 2012-13 season, order beIN SPORT 1 will broadcast matches from England’s League Cup tournament, now known as the Capital One Cup. Plus, beIN SPORT 1 will show matches from the nPower Championship, the second division in English football and one of the most competitive and entertaining leagues in Europe.

FOX Soccer previously held the rights to both the League Cup and Championship, but beIN SPORT beat the incumbent to the punch.

beIN SPORT is scheduled to launch in the United States on August 15. Based in Miami, the new soccer network will have two channels — beIN SPORT 1 (for English-language broadcasts) and beIN SPORT 2 (for Spanish-language broadcasts).

The challenge, however, will be for the network to sign deals with TV providers between now and the launch date to ensure that soccer fans can watch the TV network in the United States.

The German Bundesliga soccer league has set a new attendance record of 12.88 million fans for the 2010-11 season, with an average of 42,101 spectators watching each match.

One reason for the impressive statistic is that the average price of a ticket at a Bundesliga game is just US$33, which is considerably cheaper than ticket prices in the English Premier League.

Christian Seifert, chief executive of the German Football League, said: “For the ninth time in the last ten years we’ve had an increase in fans going to stadiums.

“The Bundesliga is booming without a doubt and yet again it is the strongest league in the world in terms of attendances, as reflected in the fact that almost 94 per cent of games were sold out.

“The key factors [in this growth] are that it is an exciting competition with attractive matches, family-friendly prices and modern stadiums.”

This season’s record represents a 0.7 per cent rise on the 2009-10 season figures. Bundesliga attendances have now risen for nine years in a row, and confirms the league’s status as the most popular in Europe.

Whilst the English Premier League had more supporters attending games overall due to having more teams in the division, the average attendance per match was 35,273.

Borussia Dortmund won the last season’s Bundesliga, finishing ahead of Bayer Leverkusen in second place and Bayern Munich in third.

Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) competition, Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC), has inked a new broadcasting deal with ESPN, giving the channel the rights to all main live UFC events until August 2013.

Confirming its status as the home of the UFC, ESPN’s extension of the existing contract guarantees that all major UFC events will be shown in the UK and Ireland for the next 12 months.

The agreement between the UFC and ESPN is for All American Pay-Per-View events and Fight Nights.

The new partnership will begin as early as Saturday August 4, with the first card to be featured under the new contract being UFC on Fox 4: Shogun vs Vera. 

ESPN televised more than 250 hours of UFC coverage and MMA-related programming in the past year, including the UK’s only dedicated, regularly televised MMA news and informaton show: MMA Live.

The world’s fastest growing sport also receives dedicated online coverage on ESPN.co.uk and ESPN.com, including the ESPN UFC Podcast.

According to a report by University of Barcelona professor José Maria Gay into the state of Spanish soccer finances, the country’s elite La Liga division has reached US$5.1bn in debt, as the league’s President confirmed plans to control spending.

The Premier League is still the most indebted league in Europe with a combined debt of $6.4bn, but the Spanish game has been warned that it is in danger of slipping into an “economic coma”.

League giants Barcelona and Real Madrid make up $1.7bn of the debt alone, though they also take in half of the $862m the Spanish league generates in overall TV revenue each year.

That inequality in revenues taken by Spanish top flight clubs has led many of its teams lower down in the league to spend significant sums in order to remain competitive.

After the top two, Valencia and Atletico Madrid are the clubs with the most debt, whilst a number of other teams are plagued by financial problems. Real Zaragoza applied for voluntary administration last month, whilst Racing Santander are struggling to pay off their debts.

All three teams promoted to La Liga this season, Real Betis, Rayo Vallecano and Granada, are also in administration. In addition, last season, Real Mallorca went into administration and were barred from playing in the Europa League.

To tackle the problem, La Liga will create a commission to monitor and control club finances, according Spanish Football League President Jose Luis Astiazaran who stated: “Spanish football needs to make progress towards an exemplary state of solvency.

“Among the clubs that form the LFP we currently have some dysfunctions which we have to get under control and we will make some decisions that will not be pleasant,” he added.

“It’s time to marry the sporting excellence we have achieved with financial excellence.

“Spanish soccer, and La Liga to be exact, has gained global admiration and we have to earn this distinction for economic management as well.”

Bellator and Russian broadcaster Russia 2 entered a partnership in which MMA fights will be shown to a potential audience of more than 83 million.

Bellator and Russia 2, allergy which is the biggest Russian sports network, viagra will start in late September.

Bellator CEO Bjorn Rebney said:“Over the last year, as the Bellator brand has experienced enormous growth and our talent team has signed the greatest Russian mixed martial artists in the world, the timing was perfect to align Bellator with Russia’s leading sports network.  R2 carries the world’s greatest sports to Russian viewers. So, aligning Bellator with this industry giant is another very exciting step forward in the evolution of the Bellator brand worldwide.”

This is a great partnership for Bellator, as the US MMA promotion continues to build a global following.  Although the UFC is the clear No. 1 MMA promotion, Bellator has steadily built a strong, dedicated group of fans – and looks to continue its international expansion.

Bellator has signed several Eastern European fighters such as phenom Alexander “Tiger” Sarnavskiy and Vitaly Minakov, joining the likes of Alexander Shlemenko, Andrey Koreshkov, Ruslan Magomedov, Akop Stepanyan, and Magomedrasul Khasbulaev.

Russia, with its strong background of boxing and sambo, has seen a dramatic increase in MMA popularity throughout the nation’s urban areas.

Uzbek billionaire Alisher Usmanov has increased his shareholding in English Premier League soccer club Arsenal to over 29 per cent.

The move comes to reinforce the businessman’s claims that he would not sell his shares after majority shareholder Stan Kroenke triggered a mandatory buyout offer in April.

Usmanov’s Red and White Holding company said in a statement: “Red & White today announces that it now holds a stake of over 29 per cent in Arsenal Holdings plc.”

Kroenke’s holding in Arsenal currently stands at 66.1 per cent after the American made an initial takeover move for Arsenal in April when he bought the stakes of the late Danny Fiszman (16.1 per cent) and Lady Nina Bracewell-Smith (15.9 per cent) for a fee of about £234m (US$378.7m).

The league’s approval of the takeover last month prompted Kroenke to give the club’s remaining shareholders 14 days’ notice on his offer to own 100 per cent.

However, Usmanov insisted he would not sell his shares, a sentiment echoed by the Arsenal Supporters’ Trust, which owns some of the remaining shares.

Usmanov bought into Arsenal in August 2007, when he bought former vice-chairman David Dein’s take of 14.65 per cent for around £75m ($121.4m).

In December 2009, Usmanov raised his stake to just over 26 per cent.

Sky Sports have agreed a new deal with the Scottish Premier League (SPL)to continue coverage of Scottish League football for at least another five years.

Sky Sports’ coverage of the 2012/13 campaign will begin with Celtic v Aberdeen this Saturday (k/o 12.45pm).

The deal will also include live Rangers matches from the Scottish Football League, beginning with their opening clash away to Peterhead on August 11 (k/o 12.45pm).

Under the new deal, subject to ratification by the SPL clubs on Friday, Sky Sports viewers will be able to enjoy 30 live matches a season, including five live Rangers fixtures from the Scottish Football League.

Also Multi-platform coverage for viewers with Sky across TV, online, mobile and tablet devices through Sky Go. 

Barney Francis, managing director of Sky Sports, said: “We’ve supported Scottish football since we started over 20 years ago, and have always wanted to continue that commitment.

“Our viewers will see the SPL for five more years and our schedule includes the opening league match for Celtic. We will also follow Rangers as they plot their way back to Scottish football’s top flight.

“Clubs now have certainty over their income and exposure across the UK and Ireland and we look forward to the new season.”

English Premier League soccer club Arsenal has signed an agreement with residential property development company Barratt Developments on a multi-million dollar contract.

Under the terms of the agreement Barratt Developments will construct 375 new homes overlooking Arsenal’s Emirates Stadium that will have an overall end value of US$207m.

According to British newspaper The News of The World, the agreement is thought to add around $40m to the clubs finances.

The latest deal marks the final stage of a nine-year regeneration project that was implemented following the Premier League club’s move from Highbury to its new 60,361-capacity home ground.

Arsenal FC director, Ken Friar said: “This is the last piece of the jigsaw in our new stadium project which has delivered huge regeneration to the Borough of Islington. 2,500 new homes and 2,500 new jobs have been created over the past six years. I am proud that we stayed in Islington and proud that Arsenal has helped contribute to the local community in this way.”

Alastair Baird, regional managing director of Barratt London, added: “The homes will be situated literally yards from the stadium and we expect them to become as sought after by Gunners fans as the properties at Chelsea Village are by Chelsea supporters.”

Work will start on the ambitious new project in January 2012 and the build programme is expected to take three years in total.

ESPN has agreed a deal with the Big 12 and the Southeastern Conference to telecast the new Champions Bowl beginning in 2015, shop according to Sports Business Daily.

Industry sources told the Daily that the two conferences will receive about $80 million per year. That total will play it with roughly the same rights that ESPN currently pays to the Big Ten and Pac-12 conferences for the Rose Bowl.

The report clearly shows that ESPN is determined to get a stranglehold on properties that could make up the major post season games in the new era where a four-team playoff will conclude the FBS season.

And it also shows some respect for the Big 12, less than a year after the conference was thought to be on its last legs as other conferences appeared ready to pick apart its membership for new members.

The leading candidate for the Champions Bowl appears to be the Dallas Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, where a bid would be backed by the Dallas Cowboys and the Cotton Bowl.

Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby said last week at the Big 12?s Media Days that he expects details of the Champions Bowl to be ironed out over the next few weeks.

It has been revealed that the champions of next year’s European Championships in Poland and Ukraine will earn up to US$33.6m after an agreement was reached at a two-day meeting of UEFA’s executive committee.

UEFA announced that they had fixed the total prize money for the 16 finalists at $280m compared to $263m for Euro 2008.

Each country will pocket $11.4m just for getting there regardless of how they perform, prostate with $1.4m on offer for a win in the group stage and $715, order 000 for a group stage draw.

Victory in the quarter-finals will be worth $2.8m, a semi-final victory will add another $4.3m, while the team winning the final will land a cool $10.7m and the runner-up $6.4m.