The Sport Thread

[Brekkie]

Very surprised at that sub license but presumably WBD have run the numbers and are happy to take the money from Sky rather than try and use it as a subscription driver for the soon to be merged BT / Eurosport.

It would have fitted better on the merged product too - I could see how it might be problematic having a weekly commitment on Eurosport itself but then again most their content is in the daytime and nowadays having part of it on streaming only isn't the issue it once was.

I do think though sometimes when Eurosport buy rights it is with one eye on selling them on too - they undoubtedly got the money back on the Olympics from selling on the PSB rights - even in countries where they had a free to air outlet they've generally onsold the linear rights.    Others though like the French Open they've kept for themselves across Europe.

However, I do wonder if selling the odd thing on is with competition concerns in mind - it isn't yet being raised as the issue it should be but at some point it will be noticed that local broadcasters are locked out by European wide deals and whether as such the likes of Discovery are too dominant in the European rights market.