The media rights for the live telecast of the ensuing football World Cup matches in India have found no takers so far with the tournament barely two months away.
Fifa is in talks with JioHotstar, which held the rights during the last quadrennial showpiece event in 2022, but with no breakthrough in sight, officials of the world football’s governing body are planning to visit Mumbai to sort out the issue later this week.
Sources told The Telegraph that Fifa officials are also likely to speak to other channels in the field, like Sony, Dream Sports-owned FanCode and Zee Entertainment.
The bone of contention has been the valuation of the media rights even after Fifa slashed its price from $100m to $35m.
Broadcasters are willing to offer anything between $15m to $20m to bag the rights. This price can increase slightly if Fifa is willing to club the media rights for 2026 and 2030 editions.
The tournament is being hosted in Canada, Mexico and the US this time. So, matches being held in an “unfriendly time zone” have contributed to the broadcasters not being too keen on picking up the rights.
“Commercial revenue will be difficult to generate since 90 of the 104 matches will be held after midnight and early morning in India. Not many broadcasters are willing to bargain given the circumstances,” a source said.
The Fifa officials had last month confirmed media rights sales for the World Cup in key Asian markets, including Japan, Korea Republic, Indonesia and Singapore.
Doordarshan had broadcast the matches when the US had hosted the World Cup last time in 1994.
Industry voices say this unwillingness is mainly due to lack of competition in the field with the merger of Star India and Viacom18. Sony is learnt to have not shown much interest since the “pricing is too steep” and “doubts over profitability from the venture”.
JioHotStar has already spent heavily on the acquisition of cricket rights in the early part of the decade, mainly towards IPL and ICC tournaments. With the IPL media rights up for grabs next year, there’s not much interest in shelling out a substantial amount of money.
The 2022 Fifa World Cup in India set a record with over 110 million viewers consuming content digitally on JioCinema.
Digital viewership surpassed TV for the first time, with 32 million users streaming the Argentina-France final on the app.
The tournament garnered over 40 billion minutes of watch time in India, digital and TV combined.
JioCinema, then part of Viacom18, had picked up the rights for $60m for the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, the timings for which were convenient for Indian viewers. JioCinema, a new player then, took the bait.
A similar situation arose in 2014 when Sony Six, a newly launched sports channel, picked up the rights for the 2014 (Brazil) and 2018 (Russia) editions for $90m.
Sony is understood to have renewed its Uefa deal for Euro 2024 and 2028 at an estimated $48m, besides securing the rights for the Champions League and Europa for three seasons from 2024-25 for $40m approximately.
In the circumstances, the Fifa officials’ proposed visit to Mumbai could attain huge significance in the coming days.