Al Jazeera Sport has acquired four of the five UEFA Champions League media rights packages in France. According to the terms of the deal, the Qatar-based broadcaster has the pay-TV, mobile and online TV rights from 2012 to 2015.

"UEFA welcomes the opportunity to develop a partnership with Al-Jazeera in France. We highly value their production expertise and commitment towards the UEFA Champions League in the Middle East and North Africa and we look forward to being part of their channel development in France. The level of interest in the UEFA Champions League rights confirms the continuing strength of the competition", said a UEFA representative in a statement. 

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Qatar- based sports network Al Jazeera Sport has reportedly acquired the broadcasting rights to the Egyptian Premier League for US$2.6 million. This will make Al Jazeera Sport the first international TV network to broadcast Egyptian Premiere League games. "We have reached an agreement with Al Jazeera that will enable it to broadcast the Egyptian League this season. They will begin airing the competition's matches in the next round until the end," said Samir Zaher, chairman of the Egyptian Football Association. 

RapidTVNews reports that Goal.com claims that Al Jazeera Sports is to bid for the rights to broadcast the English Premier League in both the MENA region and on a pay per view basis in the UK, when overseas bidding for the 2013-14 season begins.

Even more surprising, Goal.com also claims that Al Jazeera is considering entering the UK premium sports market, where broadcast rights to Premier League matches are currently shared between Sky TV and ESPN.

Invitations to tender for the next round of English Premier League TV rights are expected to be issued early next year, with winners to be announced in summer 2012. The current domestic rights deal has earned the Premier League £1.782 billion over three years. Al Jazeera has declined to comment on the speculation.

Al Jazeera currently holds the MENA rights for the FA Cup and also the UEFA Champions League. It is also the exclusive broadcaster across the Arab world for the FIFA World Cup in 2014, 2018 and 2022.

Currently, Abu Dhabi Media holds the MENA rights to the English Premier League which it broadcasts on its Abu Dhabi Sports pay channels via cable, IPTV and online.

Qatar-based Al Jazeera Sport has secured the Middle East and North Africa broadcasting rights for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups to from FIFA, according to an AFP report. The rights deal covering television, internet and mobile transmissions in 23 countries was the first to be signed for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups, world football's governing body said in a statement.

Read more at AME Info.

The National reports that Abu Dhabi’s Ministry of Economy has been receiving complaints from consumers that some distributors had raised the cost of Al Jazeera Sport viewing cards for the World Cup broadcasts, forcing the ministry to investigate on this issue. It has been reported that football fans who have paid more than the recommended price for World Cup viewing cards are being urged to keep their receipts and report the seller to the ministry.
Al Jazeera has been requested to publish adverts in newspapers reminding customers of the official cost of the card to avoid price gouging.

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Rapid TV News reports that ART is planning to exit the pay-TV market before even covering this summer's South Africa-based World Cup soccer tournament. There were signs that the agreement had broken down when ART failed to show some games from the Africa Cup competition played this past January.

ART had previously said it would cover the games despite having sold the rights to Al Jazeera Sports Channels. ART had earlier said that its subscribers would still be able to view the games under a "rebroadcast agreement" it had negotiated with Al Jazeera.
 

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The Al Jazeera Sport satellite channel last week broke a long established taboo by broadcasting a football match featuring an Israeli team on Arab television for the first time. The UEFA Champions League match between Israeli champions Maccabi Haifa and Bundesliga giants Bayern Munich was aired on the Qatar-based channel with English commentary.

Al Jazeera has obtained rights to televise Champions League matches in Arabic-speaking countries. Until last year Saudi-owned ART held the rights to broadcast Europe's premier club football competition but ART never aired a game involving an Israeli team.

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Al Jazeera Sports has won exclusive broadcast rights to UEFA Champions League matches across the Middle East and North Africa for a period of four years, dealing a blow to ART who held these rights in previous years.

The Doha-based channel beat off competition from ART, Orbit, Showtime and Abu Dhabi to secure the deal. The bid figure was not revealed.

The agreement includes rights to the quarter, semi and final UEFA Cup matches, the UEFA Super Cup and Internet and mobile rights. Live broadcast of the Champions League and the UEFA Cup will run from 2009 to 2012. The channel is expected to sub-licence live matches to a number of free-to-air broadcasters across the region.

“This is a major development for us. Right now, we have about one million subscribers. We are looking at a figure of three million subscribers in the next two years”, said General manager of Al Jazeera Sport Ayman Jadah. The channel is working on providing English commentary during matches, Jadah added.