Home » OCW News » October 2009 » Bet365 Snags England-Ukraine Football Broadcast Rights

Bet365 Snags England-Ukraine Football Broadcast Rights

Date published: 8 October 2009

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Top-rated online sportsbook, Bet365, was on the ball recently (excuse the pun) when it snapped up the rights to broadcast the Ukraine-England World Cup football qualifier on Saturday, October 10. As the match will not be televised, Bet365's live-streaming servers will be bursting at the seams.

The internet broadcast rights to broadcast the match - which most English football fans and their dogs will likely clamor to watch - were put up for sale by the Perform Group, a company that sells live sports content to the highest bidder. Its UK target market comprises publishing firms, ISPs and online sportsbooks.

Bet365 will be one of just 4 online platforms that have been licensed to broadcast the match, the others being the websites of leading UK daily newspapers, The Sun and The Times, as well as Perform Group's own pay-per-view site, UkrainevEngland.com. But Bet365 has a trick up its sleeve to attract viewers.

Unlike the other sites, it will allow its registered account holders to watch the match for free. This piece of news will undoubtedly have English and Ukrainian football fans alike clamoring to join up with Bet365, an online sports betting site that is continuing to grow from strength to strength amongst serious betting fans.

Although England has already qualified for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa, there will be no shortage of English football fans eager to watch Saturday's match which is what Bet365 will be betting on. Executives at the sportsbook will be keen to see how the live football game translates into online betting revenues.

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Said Bet365 CEO, John Coates, 'We stream over 5,000 events live a year, so when good quality matches become available, we'll look to see if we can secure them. In addition, the fact that none of the television companies in the United Kingdom snapped up the rights will make the broadcast more significant.'

Originally the rights to all of England's group games were acquired by Irish sports TV channel, Setanta. But after the broadcaster went bust, they all reverted back to Swiss firm Kentaro, one of the world's leading football rights agencies, which negotiated a live pay-per-view internet agreement with Perform Group.