Dutch commercial broadcaster SBS has acquired rights to friendly matches played by the Netherlands national football team, along with highlights to the Eerste Divisie, the second tier of domestic club football, for the 2014-15 and 2015-16 seasons.
Eredivisie Media & Marketing, which is controlled by the Fox International Channels broadcast subsidiary of 21st Century Fox, initially acquired the rights to friendly matches of the Dutch team in November, following a deal with the Dutch football federation, the KNVB.
EMM has sublicensed rights on to SBS as it no longer plans to show sport on its free-to-air general entertainment channel, Fox. It will, however, still show matches on its Fox Sports pay-television channel.
SBS will broadcast the national team games on its free-to-air SBS 6 channel, beginning with its game in Italy on September 3. Dutch listed-events legislation requires all matches of the Netherlands national team to be shown live on free-to-air television.
The 2014-15 Eerste Divisie season is scheduled to commence on August 8.