LeSports to give up exclusive rights to CSL?

The new Chinese Super League（CSL）season will kick off on March 4, 2017, but on which platform we see it is as yet unknown. There are only two more weeks to go now!

Last February, LeSports bought the exclusive digital rights for many countries and regions (mainland China included) of over 480 CSL matches. The deal was for two years from 2016 to 2017 at a price of 2.7 billion yuan. It is reported that after testing the waters for a season, LeSports has found it so hard to cover costs that it may now give up the exclusive rights.

"Tencent is rational when investing in rights, and so is Ali. Suning is beyond reason, regardless of cost they will invest in football rights," stated a senior figure in the industry.

PPTV, a subsidiary of Suning, bought the exclusive media rights of La Liga in the China Region from 2015 to 2020 for 250 million euro (about 1.8 billion yuan). In addition, Suning won the exclusive media rights of the Premier League in mainland China and Macao from 2019 to 2022 for 721 million dollars. As stated above, if Suning wins the rights to the CSL, it will monopolize the three most valuable football leagues, i.e. the English Premier League, Spain’s La Liga and the CSL.

Source：The Paper

Proofread by Sean O Diobhilin