Al Jazeera has made an audacious €130 million bid for the French rights to the Euro 2012 Championships, price beating a rival offer from French broadcasters TF1 and M6 of €100 million , according to reports.

RMC SportBFM TV has reported that Al Jazeera has held talks with Orange Sport and the French football league’s own channel, CFoot, about airing the championship. Al Jazeera does not have a sports channel of its own in the French market. However, media regulator the CSA obliges the rightsholder to air the French national team’s games in the clear, which could present a significant obstacle to the broadcaster. CFoot is present on the French digital-terrestrial pay TV platform.

It was reported last month that Al Jazeera was seeking to acquire exclusive English Premier League rights in the Middle East and also pay-per-view rights in the UK. In France is a shareholder in the Paris Saint-Germain club and owns certain rights to the French championship for the 2012-16 seasons.

Major League Baseball’s San Diego Padres have renewed their radio deal for another year with Broadcast Company of the Americas.

Broadcasters Jerry Coleman, Ted Leitner and Andy Masur will return in 2012 as part of the Padres radio lineup.

In accordance with the agreement, all Spring Training games and all 162 regular season Padres games will be broadcast on XX 1090 AM in 2012.

In addition, the Padres have added a voice to the broadcast booth in former Major League pitcher Bob Scanlan, who will share color commentary duties with Coleman, with Leitner and Masur handling the play-by-play duties.

Padres COO and team president Tom Garfinkel, said: “We’ve been missing the players’ perspective and the insight to what’s happening in the game and with Bob’s experience as a pitcher, he can bring that perspective to the fan.”

The first game to be broadcast will be the Padres annual charity game against the Mariners in Spring Training on March 4.

The first game of the regular season is set for April 5 against the Dodgers at Petco Park.

UEFA have announced they have awarded the 2012–15 UEFA Champions League media rights in the Czech Republic to Czech TV.

State broadcaster Czech TV will show the best Wednesday match live, denture the final and a highlights programme each matchweek on its free-to-air channel CT4. All rights have been granted on a platform-neutral basis, with the action also being broadcast on the internet and on mobile.

UEFA also announced they have given the 2012–15 UEFA Europa League media rights in Malta to Melita.

Pay television operator Melita will broadcast four live matches per kick-off slot across the Melita Sports family of channels. In addition, Melita will show a highlights programme every matchweek. This will guarantee extensive coverage of the competition for football fans throughout the territory.

Rights to the best live game each matchweek, including the final, have been granted on a co-exclusive basis and will be shared with public broadcaster PBS, as per a recent announcement.

All rights have been granted on a platform-neutral basis, with the rights being exploited through television, mobile and the internet.

The South Asian Football Federation (SAFF) Championship, South Asia’s top football competition will be available online for the first time after Ustream, the leader in live and interactive video streaming, secured the rights to stream the tournament.

Full coverage of all 15 matches from the SAFF Championship on Ustream kicks-off with the opening match between Bangladesh and Pakistan on December 2.  Live streaming will be available on http://www.ustream.tv/SAFF to viewers worldwide except in India, where the matches will be broadcast on a delayed basis, 24 hours after each game is played. SAFF’s marketing and media partner World Sports Group broquered the deal.

Wayne Sieve, Vice-President of Sports, Ustream, said: “Ustream is pleased to partner with World Sport Group to distribute the live games of the 2011 SAFF Championship. As the leader in live streaming video with an audience reach of 50 million unique monthly viewers, Ustream is providing the SAFF Championship with greater distribution of its matches so fans around the world can watch the live games and interact with one another.”

James Clarke, Senior Vice-President, Content, World Sport Group, added: “We are excited about our partnership with Ustream and their interactive video streaming platform which is accessible globally. With the popularity and viewership for the SAFF Championship growing particularly on the sub-continent, we want to extend the broadcast of this event beyond television to a wider global audience through mobile and broadband channels.   Ustream will help us to achieve this.”

The SAFF Championship is a biennial competition that is contested by SAFF’s eight member nations Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.   Defending champions India will host this seventh edition of the event to be held in New Delhi, India from December 2 to 11.

The BBC have agreed a new deal to broadcast the Six Nations Championship until after the 2017 tournament.

BBC Sports’ current broadcast deal which runs until 2013 will be extended until 2017 and keeps them as exclusive broadcaster covering TV, radio and online.

The 2011 Six Nations Championship saw audiences increase to their highest level for 13 years, with an average audience of 4.7m per match.

“The Six Nations is a crown jewel in the sporting calendar,” said BBC director of sport Barbara Slater.

The championship, the premier annual northern hemisphere Rugby Union tournament, is contested by England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, France and Italy every February and March.

“We’re delighted that we can continue to bring the tournament to our audiences,” Slater added.

“Viewing figures continue to grow year on year and we look forward to continuing to work in partnership with the Six Nations to build interest even further through the BBC’s unparalleled offering of TV, radio, online and interactive services.”

In total over 30 million people within Britain watched some of this year’s tournament.

John Feehan, chief executive of the Six Nations, added: “We are delighted that BBC Sport will maintain, extend and enhance its coverage of the RBS Six Nations, the world’s biggest annual rugby tournament, for a further four years to March 2017.”

Sports media broadcaster Sky Sports is being investigated by Ofcom over sponsorship credits for its international cricket coverage that constituted advertising for the performance of Jaguar cars.

One sponsorship credit for cricket coverage on Sky Sports 1 featured a Jaguar car driving on a very wet road accompanied by Sky commentator David ‘Bumble’ Lloyd saying: “Well, that bit of rain hasn’t changed the performance at all.”

Media regulator Ofcom launched an investigation of the sponsorship under Rule 9.22(a) of the Broadcasting Code, which states that credits “must not contain advertising messages”.

Sky attempted to argue that cricket is “notoriously linked with delays for rain”, and so the Jaguar sponsorship credit thematically linked the sponsor to the programme in “an elegant and interesting fashion”.

The broadcaster said that the voiceover given by commentator Lloyd made “an obvious and immediate link from the sponsored programme to the sponsor credit”.

However, Ofcom disagreed with Sky that the word “performance” clearly referred to the actions of the cricketers, and not solely the quality of the car.

The regulator acknowledged that Sky had tried to identify the sponsorship relationship between Jaguar and International Cricket by linking wet weather and the interruption of cricketing play.

Ofcom also accepted that the sponsorship slogan could have a “double meaning” in the minds of viewers, as in referring to the effect of rain on the cricket and the car’s performance on the road.

However, the watchdog ruled that the the double meaning “does not necessarily prevent it from also amounting to an advertising message or claim about the sponsor or its products”, largely because the credit did not feature any images of cricket.

“Ofcom considered that the intended double meaning of the phrase was unlikely to have been sufficiently clear to the audience. This was because, in Ofcom’s view, there was more emphasis in the credit on the performance of the sponsor’s product and its performance, than on cricket,” said the regulator.

“While we took into account that the voiceover stating ‘Well, that bit of rain hasn’t changed the performance at all’ was read by a Sky cricket commentator, the visual that accompanied the voiceover was of a Jaguar car driving in extremely wet conditions. There was no cricket imagery and no reference to any specific cricketing term.

“Ofcom concluded that viewers were therefore likely to understand the reference to ‘performance’ to relate to the way in which the featured car functioned in wet driving conditions… it was a claim about a specific attribute of the sponsor’s product, capable of objective substantiation. Such claims are not permitted in sponsorship credits.”

GBsport.tv has partnered with the London Organising Committee for the Olympic Games (LOCOG) and British Handball to stream the GB matches at the London Handball Cup this week, and live from the new Handball Arena in the Olympic Park.

GB Women’s Team take on Angola this Wednesday at 1300 and then face Austria on Friday at 1030, and with a place in the Semi-Final against Slovakia, Poland or China to play for.

This six-team International event is being staged at the Olympic Handball Arena as part of the London Prepares Series and is intended to provide officials the opportunity to test procedures ahead of Games Time in 2012, with a limited crowd of officials, local schools and media invited to attend.

Paul Goodwin, CEO at British Handball commented “We are really excited to be working with GBsport TV at the largest handball event ever to be held in Britain. The tickets for this event were not publicly available so this broadcast will provide the British public with a preview of what is in store during the Olympic Games and will surprise many at just how fast and physical the sport is”.

The exclusive GBsport production and live stream continues a successful partnership with LOCOG, which started with the London Prepares Basketball events during the summer.

Dan Fletcher, General Manager GBsport TV, said: “GBsport TV has been developed to be as accessible as possible for real sports fans” said , “Our live and on-demand coverage can be enjoyed for free on your laptop or if you’re on the move using a smartphone or tablet.”

India’s largest sports network Ten Sports has entered into long term partnership with International Hockey Federation to acquire the broadcasting rights for the major FIH Championships till 2014.

As part of the agreement TEN Sports will be broadcasting over 50 India playing matches the next four years from major men’s hockey tournament from around the world.

Atul Pande, CEO-Ten Sports said: “ Our long term agreement with FIH reaffirms our commitment to bring  the best sports action to our viewers, and this new agreement for telecast best of men hockey Champions Challenge and Champions Trophy, reaffirms our commitment to grow the sports business and consolidate our position as the leading sports broadcaster.”

Leandro Negre, FIH President, added: “We’re delighted to extend our long-term partnership with Ten Sports for a further 4 years.  This deal is of unprecedented value to FIH, not only in terms of the record license fee, but also for us to guarantee hockey fans and FIH sponsors unparalleled exposure for the world’s best hockey events on the subcontinent’s most-watched sports channel.

The Scottish Premier League (SPL) have extended their broadcasting deal with Sky and ESPN until 2017.

Both broadcasters announced they had agreed a new five-year deal offering more money than their existing contract.

The SPL secured a £13 million ($20.3m) annual commitment from the broadcasters when they signed the initial contract in 2009, with the new deal taking effect from the start of next season.

Both television companies, who stepped in when Setanta went out of business in the middle of their more lucrative rights deal, will each continue to show 30 live games a season.

The SPL had employed consultants IMG Media to instigate a feasibility study into the launch of their own television channel but they have been encouraged by recent viewing figures.

The news comes less than two weeks after Clydesdale Bank announced they would end their sponsorship of the competition at the end of next season.

In a statement, SPL chief executive Neil Doncaster said: “Sky Sports and ESPN are two of the biggest names in sports broadcasting and the SPL has enjoyed an excellent relationship with both broadcasters over the course of the current contract, a period which has seen a 28 per cent increase in viewing figures.

“In the current economic climate, announcing an increase in value is excellent news for our clubs.”

Barney Francis, managing director of Sky Sports, added: “We’re delighted to agree this deal with the SPL and continue our partnership with Scottish football that began 20 years ago.

“This long-term agreement means Sky Sports viewers can continue to enjoy coverage of 30 live matches a season, including each Old Firm head-to-head, across TV, mobile, online and tablet devices.”

Ross Hair, managing director of ESPN in Europe, added: “The Clydesdale Bank Premier League has been an important part of our schedule in these first two-and-a-half seasons of our local ESPN channel in the UK and Ireland.

“Scottish football has performed well on ESPN as we work to build our brand locally and develop our long-term business.”

Doncaster is also confident the longer term security and continued high profile afforded to the SPL by the new live TV rights deal will help attract several new suitors to replace Clydesdale Bank.

“The timing of this announcement could undoubtedly not be better from my point of view,” said Doncaster.

“Because to go out to the market place to try to find a title sponsor when you haven’t got a robust, credible live broadcast product, frankly that’s a difficult task.

“But to go to the market place now with the certainty of this five year deal, with the exposure that any sponsor gets through that live deal, is a big part of why they choose to sponsor a league. So it’s fundamental.

“I certainly do expect there will be a lot of interest. The SPL remains Scotland’s foremost sporting competition and in terms of the coverage it’s had over the past few years, the coverage it’s going to have over the next five years with Sky and ESPN and the drama and excitement for which it’s renowned, not just in the UK but overseas, that’s set to continue.

“That’s what any sponsor who ties themselves to the SPL is buying into.

“There has already been interest from potential new sponsors. We will conduct a thorough investigation in the market place, we’ll be open-minded about who we talk to, who shows interest, and then my job is to create options we can bring back to the table and the clubs can vote on.”