World Snooker, IMG Media extend television rights partnership with Eurosport – Snooker news
World Snooker and IMG Media have extended their television partnership with Eurosport for an additional five seasons.
Eurosport will now be covering almost all the Snooker events that will take place from the 2011-12 season until the 2015-16 season.
Previously, Eurosport was covering 10 tournaments per season but with this new contract, the coverage has almost been doubled, as now Eurosport will be covering 19 tournaments per season.
The World Snooker Chairman, Barry Hearn, is very pleased with the new contract, as he reckons the extension of the contract with Eurosport is really going to help in building a bright future for the game.
Hearn told the media that World Snooker has established a few new tournaments, which will also be covered by Eurosport. He added these events will now be shown to over 125 million homes in Europe, which was great.
While speaking on the deal, he said, “We have established new events in the continent including the German Masters ranking event and the European PTC tournaments, and we're delighted that all of these will be screened by Eurosport. The spread of snooker
in the region has been phenomenal in recent years and this is a key part of our continued efforts to make it a global sport.”
Hearn in the end revealed that with the help of Eurosport they have also been getting good revenues, which he thinks is another plus point for the sport. He remarked he is now looking forward to further expand the revenues so that he, with the help of World
Snooker, manages some new tournaments with even more prize money for the players.
He said, “Revenues from our International broadcast agreements are becoming significantly more relevant for our business and the sport as a whole. Expanding these revenue streams will help us to create new events with more prize money for the players.”
The Snooker World Cup has recently returned after a long time, as it was last held in 1996. However let’s see if World Snooker brings up more tournaments for the calendar, as it is going to give a great variety to the sport.
Tags: