The English Football League, which operates the three divisions below the top-tier Premier League, has agreed a four-season deal for free-to-air DTT channel Quest to become its new partner for highlights of its competitions.
Quest, which is owned by US media group Discovery Communications, will replace commercial broadcaster Channel Five as the free-to-air highlights rights-holder, with its contract running from 2018-19 to 2021-22.
Quest will become the new home of highlights of the Championship, League One and League Two, as well as the EFL Cup and EFL Trophy. Quest will provide 90 minutes of extensive match highlights in primetime at 9pm every Saturday night.
In a new addition, Quest will broadcast 10 hour-long highlights shows capturing all the action from every round of midweek fixtures. Quest will also present eight, hour-long highlights shows from the EFL Cup and EFL Trophy as part of the arrangement.
In a first for the EFL, Quest will produce ‘The Reaction’ a new weekly interactive series on social media platform Facebook. With a strong focus on engaging fans from clubs across the country, the series will offer the opportunity for supporters to voice their views and opinions following the conclusion of the day’s matches.
Simon Downing, head of Quest and Eurosport UK, said: “It’s our shared ambition to make coverage of these competitions accessible to as many people as possible, across all consumer platforms.
“We aim to deliver a high-quality free-to-air highlights show that is accessible, catering for all football fans and leveraging the reach of digital platforms to engage more people with the EFL, its clubs and competitions.”
In September, the EFL agreed a five-season extension to its rights deal with pay-television broadcaster Sky, running from 2019-20 to 2023-24.
The deal is worth £600m (€683.4m/$825m), representing a 36-per-cent year-on-year increase on the previous arrangement, which was set to expire at the end of the 2018-19 campaign.
Under the deal, Sky retains exclusive live rights to the EFL leagues, EFL Cup, EFL Trophy and play-off games across the Championship, League One and League Two through to May 2024.