TV2 Denmark, the government-owned subscription and free-to-air broadcaster, has added rights to Uefa’s Europa League and newly-created third-tier Europa Conference League, while extending its recent LaLiga rights renewal by a further two seasons.
The three-season deal with Uefa, from 2021-22 to 2022-23, is for exclusive rights to all matches from Uefa’s lower-tier club competitions.
The matches will be broadcast across TV2’s channels as well as on its TV2 Play OTT streaming service. Frederik Lauesen, sports manager at TV2 has said that if a Danish side has a important match then TV2 will “be able to broadcast on the main [TV2] channel”.
Discovery-owned sports broadcaster Eurosport currently holds rights to the Europa League in Denmark in a three-season deal, from 2018-19 to 2020-21. It has held rights since the 2015-16 season.
Uefa’s exclusive sales agency for club competitions, Team Marketing, initiated the sales process for media rights in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden on February 25, with a bid deadline of 10am (CET) on March 31.
TV2 has recently agreed a new three-season deal to Spain’s LaLiga in the country, from 2021-22 to 2023-24. The broadcaster has subsequently announced the deal has been extended for a further two years, until 2025-26.
Last month LaLiga, the governing body for the top two tiers of Spanish domestic football, was given authorisation to sell future broadcast rights in Europe for more than three-seasons in amends made to the Royal Decree that governs the sale of centralised rights.
This is thought to be the first occasion since the Royal Decree that LaLiga has agreed a five-season deal.
TV2’s Europa League/Europa Conference League deal follows on from Nordic Entertainment (Nent) Group’s announcement last month that it had acquired Uefa Champions League rights in Denmark for the 2021-24 cycle.
Nent also picked up rights to the Europa League and Europa Conference League in Finland, Norway and Sweden. Commercial and pay-television broadcaster TV2 acquired Champions League rights in Norway. Champions League rights in Finland and Sweden are yet to be announced but both are thought to have been acquired by telco Telia, which owns the Swedish media group Bonnier and Finnish pay-television broadcaster MTV3.
