Also dam, I can't think of any French players that are not descendants of immigrants from other countries. i thought Cantona but he is of Sardinian and Catalan descent. Pires is Portugues descent. Ribery is a muslim which I know of the religion situation in France. i really can't think of a French ethnic person with family that lived in France for generations and is Christian that plays/played for France. Also sorry for being off subject.
Back the original topic. Al Jazeera Sports would need to sign up 3 million subscribers at EURO 11/month in order to break even on its two new sports TV channels in France. However, the "1st pick" Ligue 1 matches rarely draw more than 1 million households on Canal Plus in France. Al Jazeera Sports' "business plan" in France is "irrational" with no chance of ever making money, just like Abu Dhabi Media Company's "business plan" in the MENA ex-Israel ex-Turkey region with its massive overbid for the media rights to the English Premier League in 2010-2013: $100 million/season in a region with 3.6 million pay TV households total. Al Jazeera Sports is exporting its irrational "business plan" to the U.S. market and likely the U.K. market as well.
Then if making money isnt their objective in these tv rights then what is? I mean they can't be THAT stupid can they?
"Marketing and public relations" for the ruling families of countries with "petro currency" who own the TV networks that are making the irrational bids for media rights to European club soccer. Read the following report to understand why Al Jazeera Sports (and Abu Dhabi Media Company) are bidding up media rights to European club soccer both in MENA ex-Israel ex-Turkey, but also in France and the U.S. and soon the U.K. in the case of Al Jazeera Sports. http://www.telecomsmarketresearch.com/resources/Arab_television_1.shtml For Orbit Showtime Networks (OSN), the most significant omission from its lineup is the most sought after sports content, particularly soccer. Much of this has been acquired by Al Jazeera Sports (AJS) and Abu Dhabi Media Company (ADMC), with their state-backed operations having the financial muscle to outbid OSN, even if the business case for doing so is not there. This type of 'vanity' operation has been a recurring theme in the region and while the creation of OSN is a move towards a commercially-run sector, there are still services operating where return on investment (ROI) is a desirable outcome rather than an essential one. The difficulty of course is that operations with a non-commercial objective compromise those with commercial strategies, as they have high costs but less compunction to make a profit. They have lavish budgets but little chance of becoming financially self-sufficient. There are no signs of the non-commercial services being closed by their backers - putting the likes of OSN on the back foot in content auctions.
Aljazeera is not in to make money...... They have plenty of it and they only want recognition. Also I think this will make la liga more popular in the states they will spend whatever amount of money to make it happen , they done that in there news and sport packages no one can overspend them period. Also aljazeera control around 50% of the Arabic package that dish carry And it's one of the best package making money for dish , they have more than one million subscriber I think at around $50 . Aljazeera aim objective I think is to package there sport ch with there English news ch that they have difficulty selling it to the American carrier . Now they will have more leverage to package both networks together ..... Aljazeera want to be the biggest network in the world and they will succeed they will outbid anyone period..... For me as an Arab American it's a dream come true I can't wait to have the Madrid games in three languages that I am very fluent in, Arabic English and Spanish , as for you guys I understand your concern but let me assure you that aljazeera will do a heck of a job to please all there fans..... Now goltv is carried only by directv and not dish but with aljazeera they will have it for both sattalite provider ..... I hope for thr best
The problem is that AJ should have created a network or bought an existing one before they got the tv rights because by the time they do create a network that reaches enough homes to matter it would be too late because their tv rights would expire. There has been discussion that AJ could buy GolTv but Mediapro is more likely to want to help AJ make a brand new channel because Mediapro would make more money than if they just helped AJ buy Goltv out. Short term it will probably suck for the fans but long term is unpredictable.
Goltv sucks a big one. The Malaga- Espanyol match is in the 23rd minute as of now and its on no live tv channel. Osasuna-Levante is on the Directv channel but Malaga-Esp. is not live. Goltv is gonna show the mathc but 30 minutes late and are saying its "live" on their channel info. Instead of showing the game when it really starts they are showing infomercials and choose to show it 30 minutes late.
WOW....Goltv are putting the "LIVE" banner on top of the screen for the Malaga-Espanyol match even though they just started showing the match from the start of it 30 minutes late from when it really began. They are flat out lying. Right now the score is 1-0 in the 35th minute but Goltv is showing the match at the 1st minute 0-0 saying its live.
I haven't gone through all the posts, so forgive me if this has already been said. One channel of the current Aljazeera package is in English (Aljazeera +3), broadcasts from London. The presenters are all English, you get people like Gary Lineker and Revista de La Liga's Scott Minto to present the pre-match shows. They get Garry Neville, Ray Wilkins, Graham Souness and many more. The commentary is taken from the International feed and most of the time it is Sky Sports commentary. With the other channels (1, 2, +1, +2, +4 to +10), you can always change the Audio Channel and you can listen to English commentary. I imagine they will do something similar in the US.
I was thinking about this the other day, if AJ can provide viewers in the us with knowledgeable people in the studio it would be a step up from what fsc gives us. I havent watched a pre/half/post match studio show since Setanta went bust. I would even be good with english voice overs over spanish, french or italian studio analysis.
The one thing that we have learned from the Dubai debt fiasco is to be skeptical. Dubai was building mega-real estate projects with seemingly an unlimited supply of "petro currency", but we found out the truth when the debt markets were disrupted. Now that Qatar (Paris St. Germain, FC Barcelona, Al Jazeera), Abu Dhabi (Manchester City and ADMC), and Ras al Khaimah (Real Madrid CF-theme island resort) are all carrying out public relations-driven projects, one would have to wonder whether all of these projects are actually funded by "petro currency".
they did the same for the Pre-season Arsenal Emirates Cup. Started it 10-20 mins late and called it live.
It's not just about money though. This is an election year. Expect all the dirty tricks to come out. Is La Liga that much of a leverage? Even the Premier League? Maybe the Premier League is but enough to overcome the stigma? I'm sure they would if they could, but look how long it took Comcast to even offer FSC HD. And that's 30,000 subscribers nationwide across all carriers. How many people do you think would want to watch an Arabic channel playing soccer all day. I hope they can get through the rigmarole and get both their sports channel on the sports tier and the news channel on any tier (so we can get some real news and not the yelling sessions, xenophobia and reality news tv that we have now), but I have a bad feeling about what might happen. I hope I'm just being overreactionary.
As long as Al Jazeera get La Liga on TV next year, I don't care that they have the rights. But if they don't....... By gosh I will type very angry messages on this board multiple times!!
I can now predict with 99.9999% confidence (i.e. 6-sigma) that the new Spanish-language sports TV network Al Jazeera will launch in the U.S. Hispanic market in August 2012 to carry live coverage of the Spanish Primera Division will NOT carry the "Al Jazeera" brand. = Al Jazeera has a launched a new sports TV brand in France. The new brand will be... Be In Sport Be In Sport 1 and Be In Sport 2 in France will cost EURO 11/month. http://www.digitaltveurope.net/22428...orts-channels/ http://www.digitaltveurope.net/22359...port-channels/ -- I now expect a new French-language sports network targeting Quebec/Atlantic Canada (pending licensing approval by the CRTC, which will require the addition of Canadian Content) with spillover into the U.S., Spanish-speaking Latin America, Brazil, and the Caribbean to carry the "Be In Sport" brand, i.e. "Be In Sport International". That channel will transmit French Ligue 1 matches live around the world during the 2012-2018 seasons in all countries and territories except France. Al Jazeera paid only EURO 32 million/season for worldwide media rights to Ligue 1 excluding France.
Yea it really is a crap name for a channel. Sounds like broken English. Also I guess this means the end for Goltv on Sports Pack , maybe even it's existence. Espn Deportes luckily has ESPN to back it up. Also to add the name of that channel kind of makes it sound like it got a B grade in Sport. Basically to me its saying "we can't get an A or A+ but we are a B quality channel". This channel better be on Sport pack or the Spanish packages. if they think they are gonna charge $15 or more for a league I can watch now as part of my Spanish package then they are nuts. Lucky for everyone too is that La Liga is terrible when it comes to removing their content on illegal streams. The EPL or UEFA make it impossible to watch their games online because they stop the streams. La Liga either doesn't do that or sucks at doing it because I can watch Madrid games on illegal streams easily without any interference.
I also feel like this is gonna push back soccer in the US because of Al Jazeera's insistence to sell the "Qatar experience" which frankly no westerner even wants. If Univision or Fox won the rights they would have pushed the sport more but instead we are gonna most likely end up with a channel hardly any provider carries and one that will be priced very high.
The GOLTV-ESPN Deportes partnership has renewed U.S. rights to Bundesliga through May 2015 and the Brazilian package from Globo through December 2015. Brazilian package is for TV only with no internet or mobile rights. GOLTV also has a deal with the AFA for U.S. rights to Argentine league matches involving Boca Juniors and River Plate through 2014. The problem for GOLTV: none of those brands draw enough interest from English-speaking viewers. Not Bayern Munich, not Boca, not River, not the Brazilian brands. DIRECTV knows that. (And DIRECTV has already removed FOX Deportes from the Sports Pack for the same reason: not enough English-speaking viewers watch the Mexican and South American brands.) Comcast knows that. Time Warner knows that. Bright House knows that. COX knows that. Charter knows that.
Remember that La Liga does NOT have anyone in house to handle international media. Instead, La Liga hires MEDIAPRO to handle everything. MEDIAPRO is too busy counting "petro currency" (as well as the cash from Asia courtesy Mr. Murdoch and the 4-letter outfit) to police illegal video streams.
So, huhe: what chances do you see for us Dish subscribers to not have to pay "extra" (e.g. subscribe to yet another channel) to be able to watch La Liga starting next season??
MEDIAPRO hasn't sold the rights to the Copa del Rey Round of 32 through Semifinal yet for 2013-2015. That contract isn't worth that much in the U.S. because the matches are all on weekdays. Santa Monica Sports handles international video sales and distribution for the SuperCopa and the Copa del Rey Final. These products belong to the RFEF (the Royal Spanish Football Federation,) not the LFP (La Liga).