For weeks there has been a dispute between Fifa and the TV stations about the transmission of the women’s World Cup. A report now wants to know the sums offered.
The dispute over the broadcasting rights to the women’s soccer World Cup in summer has been smoldering for weeks. Fifa and the TV stations of the leading European football nations have still not been able to agree on a deal, and there is a risk of a TV blackout. On the one hand, the broadcasters, including the German public broadcasters ARD and ZDF, accuse Fifa of greed. On the other hand, Fifa is talking about unreasonably low offers.
Fifa President Gianni Infantino recently spoke of a “moral and legal obligation not to undersell the Women’s World Cup”. His threat: “We will therefore be forced not to broadcast the Women’s World Cup in the big five European countries if the offers continue to be unfair.”
Germany offers five million euros
The magazine “Kicker” is now presenting concrete figures on the dispute. Accordingly, the German TV stations would like to pay five million euros for the rights to the women’s World Cup. The sheet also lists comparative values that are intended to classify the dimension of the offer. ARD and ZDF paid 214 million euros for the men’s World Cup last winter and even made 218 million euros available for the 2018 tournament in Russia. The offer for the women’s tournament is therefore less than three percent of these sums.
Another comparison: the production of a Saturday evening show with Carmen Nebel (now discontinued) or Florian Silbereisen cost the stations 1.5 million euros each.
Italy offers less, Great Britain more
According to the report, the German offer is the second lowest. It would be undercut by the Italian broadcasters, for whom the women’s tournament was worth one million euros. They paid 160 million euros for the men’s World Cup, for which the Italians, unlike the women, did not qualify. According to the “kicker”, the best offer came from Great Britain with almost eight million euros. However, this also does not meet the requirements of Fifa, which probably wants ten million euros from the countries.
150 countries around the world have already acquired the broadcasting rights for the World Cup, which begins on July 20th. A point that gives the European broadcaster a headache: the early kick-off times. As the tournament will be held in Australia and New Zealand, the games will be played morning to noon European time. The three German group games start at 10:30 a.m. (Morocco), 11:30 a.m. (Colombia) and 12:00 p.m. (South Korea). Employees will therefore find it difficult to follow the games on TV, even if the second game falls on a Sunday.
So it remains to be seen whether the broadcasters and Fifa will come to an agreement before the start of the tournament.
