The English Premier League has secured televised coverage in 10 Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) countries in addition to Georgia via an agreement with the Saram Media Group.
Starting from the 2022/23 season and concluding with the last game of the 2024/25 campaign, the three-year deal has seen Saram gain exclusive live, delayed, highlights and clips rights across television, online and mobile platforms.
The media group will broadcast English top-flight fixtures in Afghanistan, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, as well as the aforementioned Georgia.
“The Premier League is pleased to partner with Saran Media Group for another three seasons,” commented Paul Molnar, Chief Media Officer at the Premier League.
“Saran is a long-standing Premier League partner providing excellent sports coverage, and Premier League fans can look forward to more live matches on Saran than ever before in this region.”
Meanwhile, in CIS member country Russia the rights to the Premier League have been picked up by Gazprom Media-owned Match TV, whilst in the Balkan region Arena Sport, part of the Telekom Srbija group, will provide coverage.
“We are proud of our broadcast partnership with the Premier League and excited to have extended the rights for another three years,” said Saran Media’s Head of Sports, Selim Usta.
“Through the distribution of the Premier League broadcast across all of the 11 territories above, football fans will have the best possible viewing experience.”
In the Premier League’s home market of the UK, the government approved the rolling over of the existing media rights deals for England’s top-tier football league with Sky Sports, BT Sport, Amazon Prime and BBC Sport.
The League required sign-off from the government on its intention to skip a tendering process and simply renew its existing media rights contract with the above broadcasters, described as a ‘temporary measure’ to ‘provide certainty to clubs’ due to the financial implications of the COVID-19 pandemic.