Premier Sports is a group of pay

sports television The broadcasting of sports events (also known as a sportscast) is the live coverage of sports as a television program, on radio, and other broadcasting media. It usually involves one and more sports commentators describing events as they happen ...

channels owned by SSBL Limited that are available in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

and

Ireland Ireland (, ; ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe. Geopolitically, the island is divided between the Republic of Ireland (officially Names of the Irish state, named Irelan ...

. Premier Sports holds exclusive live rights to

La Liga The Campeonato Nacional de Liga de Primera División, commonly known as the Primera División or La Liga, and officially known as LaLiga EA Sports for sponsorship reasons, is a professional association football league in Spain and the highest ...

Scottish League Cup The Scottish League Cup, also known as the Premier Sports Cup for sponsorship reasons, is a football competition open to all Scottish Professional Football League (SPFL) clubs. First held in 1946–47, it is the oldest national League cup in ...

Elite Ice Hockey League The Elite Ice Hockey League (EIHL), sometimes referred to internationally as the British Elite League, is an ice hockey league in the United Kingdom. Formed in 2003 following the demise of the Ice Hockey Superleague, it is the highest level ...

NHL The National Hockey League (NHL; , ''LNH'') is a professional ice hockey league in North America composed of 32 teams25 in the United States and 7 in Canada. The NHL is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United States and Cana ...

and

NASCAR The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, LLC (NASCAR) is an American auto racing sanctioning and operating company that is best known for stock car racing. It is considered to be one of the top ranked motorsports organizations in ...

. Premier Sports has shared rights to the

United Rugby Championship The United Rugby Championship (URC) is an annual rugby union competition involving professional teams from Ireland, Italy, Scotland, South Africa, and Wales. For sponsorship reasons the league is known as the Vodacom United Rugby Championship in ...

in the Britain and exclusive live rights to 53

Premier League The Premier League is a professional association football league in England and the highest level of the English football league system. Contested by 20 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion and relegation with the English Football Lea ...

games in the Republic of Ireland. They also hold shared rights to the

Scottish Cup The Scottish Football Association Challenge Cup,BBC Scotland BBC Scotland is a division of the BBC and the main public broadcaster in Scotland. Its headquarters are in Glasgow, employing approximately 1,250 staff as of 2017, to produce 15,000 hours of television and radio programming per year. BBC Scotla ...

History

Premier Sports was formed in 2009 by the Irish businessman Michael O'Rourke, a joint CEO and part owner of

Setanta Sports Setanta Sports Media is a sports television company based in Dublin, Ireland and in Tbilisi, Georgia, broadcasting throughout select Eurasian countries, and the Philippines. The company was formed in 1990 to facilitate the broadcasting of Iris ...

and former director of Premium Sports. The channel initially focused on broadcasting sporting events that had not been available in

Great Britain Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the north-west coast of continental Europe, consisting of the countries England, Scotland, and Wales. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the List of European ...

since the collapse of Setanta Sports GB on 22 June 2009, and were not picked up by rival sports broadcasters

ESPN ESPN (an initialism of their original name, which was the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by the Walt Disney Company (80% and operational control) and Hearst Commu ...

and

Sky Sports Sky Sports is a group of British broadcasting of sports events, subscription sports channels operated by the satellite television, satellite pay television company Sky Group (a division of Comcast), and is the dominant subscription television ...

, but are available through Setanta in Ireland. The channel's management is made up of CEO O'Rourke, General Manager Richard Sweeney and Operations Director Richard Webb. In April 2013, Premier Sports and Premier Sports Extra began to share their satellite stream with Setanta Sports 1; the arrangement continued after Premier Sports Extra closed on 13 June 2013. Only Premier Sports' branding appears on the channel, with the exception of Setanta's coverage of the

, which was blocked on Premier Sports. It was revealed in July 2022 that in 2021 the company had 222,000 paying subscribers and revenues of £26.4 million in 2021. In July 2022,

Viaplay Group Viaplay Group AB, formerly known as Nordic Entertainment Group AB (NENT Group), is a Swedish media and entertainment company headquartered in Stockholm. The company operates the video streaming services Viaplay, advertising-funded TV and radio ...

announced the acquisition of Premier Sports in the UK and its intention to rebrand the channels under its own brand. This did not affect its operations Ireland where the company continued to be owned by SSBL Ltd and continued to branded as Premier Sports Viaplay rebranded Premier Sports under the Viaplay Sports name on 1 November 2022. Viaplay Sports operate out of

Stockholm Stockholm (; ) is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in Sweden by population, most populous city of Sweden, as well as the List of urban areas in the Nordic countries, largest urban area in the Nordic countries. Approximately ...

, Sweden. Initially, the same feeds were used for the UK and Ireland with Premier Sports branding used for Premier League coverage which is blocked in the UK. On 28 November the channels split, with the Irish feeds reverting to full Premier Sports branding. In November 2023, it was announced that Premier Sports had bought Viaplay out in the UK and would rebrand the channels back to Premier Sports.

Availability

Premier Sports operates on satellite provider

Sky The sky is an unobstructed view upward from the planetary surface, surface of the Earth. It includes the atmosphere of Earth, atmosphere and outer space. It may also be considered a place between the ground and outer space, thus distinct from ...

. MSK and MSK Extra were added to Sky on 25 September 2009 and relabelled Premier Sports and Premier Sports Extra on 29 July 2010. On 13 June 2013, Premier Sports Extra closed with its Sky EPG slot believed to have been sold to the Muslim World Network, which launched on the same day. Premier Sports Extra only operated for a limited number of hours during midweek, when Premier Sports closed as they used a single satellite stream. The channels were

free-to-air Free-to-air (FTA) services are television (TV) and radio services broadcast in unencrypted form, allowing any person with the appropriate receiving equipment to receive the signal and view or listen to the content without requiring a subscri ...

to both domestic and commercial customers from launch, but became a pay subscription channel on 5 August 2010. However, the channel is sold independently by Premier Sports, rather than through Sky. On 30 June 2010, the video

bit rate In telecommunications and computing, bit rate (bitrate or as a variable ''R'') is the number of bits that are conveyed or processed per unit of time. The bit rate is expressed in the unit bit per second (symbol: bit/s), often in conjunction ...

was increased from 2.8 Mbit/s to 4.2 Mbit/s. Initially, Premier Sports was only available in

, but became available in Northern Ireland on 3 November 2011. Premier Sports Extra was still limited to Great Britain until its closure. For many years, Premier Sports was not available on

Virgin Media Virgin Media Limited is a British telecommunications company which provides telephone, television and internet services in the United Kingdom. Its headquarters are at Green Park in Reading, England. It is owned by Virgin Media O2, a 50:50 ...

, although negotiations were held in early 2012. Talks broke down when the company declined Virgin Media's offer to distribute the channel as a standalone add-on, as it is on satellite, as the former wanted to be bundled into one of the latter's basic TV packages. On 25 October 2013, the channel launched on Virgin Media as a free channel, the day before the start of the

2013 Rugby League World Cup The 2013 Rugby League World Cup was the fourteenth World Cup for men’s national rugby league teams. It took place between the 26 October and 30 November and was hosted by England and Wales (although some games were played in France and Ire ...

; It became a subscription channel on 1 March 2014. On 22 August 2014, Premier Sports, along with

BoxNation BoxNation was a British dedicated boxing subscription television channel, operated by Viaplay. The brand is licensed from George Warren's Queensbury Commercial. History BoxNation was launched by Frank Warren Promotions as a free-to-air channe ...

, launched on TalkTalk; it was removed on 9 August 2016. In August 2012, Premier Sports launched an online subscription streaming service, run in conjunction with

Ustream IBM Watson Media (formerly Ustream and IBM Cloud Video) is an American virtual events platform company which is a division of IBM. Prior to the IBM acquisition, it had more than 180 employees across San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Budapest office ...

. The 2 Mbit/s stream broadcast all events and programming on the TV channel. In April 2013, Premier Sports launched their own online player to replace the Ustream service. The service is available on multiple platforms including

iOS Ios, Io or Nio (, ; ; locally Nios, Νιός) is a Greek island in the Cyclades group in the Aegean Sea. Ios is a hilly island with cliffs down to the sea on most sides. It is situated halfway between Naxos and Santorini. It is about long an ...

and Android. As well as live streaming, the service also features seven day catch-up and optional season long on-demand content. Some sports are also available to view worldwide. On 30 April 2018, Premier Sports announced they would launch a Premier Sports 2 channel on the

and

Virgin Virginity is a social construct that denotes the state of a person who has never engaged in sexual intercourse. As it is not an objective term with an operational definition, social definitions of what constitutes virginity, or the lack thereof ...

platforms after signing a contract with PRO14 Rugby to broadcast every game across the UK for at least the next three years. The HD channel was relabelled Premier Sports 1 on 18 July and launched on Virgin Media, replacing the SD version, which simultaneously was relabelled Premier Sports 2. New logos were adopted for both Premier Sports and its sister channel

FreeSports Viaplay Xtra was a British sports television channel operated and owned by Viaplay Group. History Viaplay Xtra launched as FreeSports on 31 August 2017 and was closed down on 25 January 2024 with the aim to provide free-to-air sports covera ...

Subsidiary channels

On 31 August 2017, Premier Sports launched their sister channel

, a free-to-air sports channel providing live sport. It was available on all major platforms available in 18 million UK homes. FreeSports aimed to air a majority of live programming, with over 1000 events a year for an average of 10 hours per day featuring numerous sports, including

MMA Mixed martial arts (MMA) is a full-contact fighting sport based on striking and grappling; incorporating techniques from various combat sports from around the world. In the early 20th century, various inter-stylistic contests took place t ...

kickboxing Kickboxing ( ) is a full-contact hybrid Martial arts, martial art and Boxing (disambiguation), boxing type based on punch (combat), punching and kicking. Kickboxing originated in the 1950s to 1970s. The fight takes place in a boxing ring, norma ...

association football Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 Football player, players who almost exclusively use their feet to propel a Ball (association football), ball around a rectangular f ...

ice hockey Ice hockey (or simply hockey in North America) is a team sport played on ice skates, usually on an Ice rink, ice skating rink with Ice hockey rink, lines and markings specific to the sport. It belongs to a family of sports called hockey. Tw ...

tennis Tennis is a List of racket sports, racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent (singles (tennis), singles) or between two teams of two players each (doubles (tennis), doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket st ...

rugby league Rugby league football, commonly known as rugby league in English-speaking countries and rugby 13/XIII in non-Anglophone Europe, is a contact sport, full-contact sport played by two teams of thirteen players on a rectangular Rugby league playin ...

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appro ...

boxing Boxing is a combat sport and martial art. Taking place in a boxing ring, it involves two people – usually wearing protective equipment, such as boxing glove, protective gloves, hand wraps, and mouthguards – throwing Punch (combat), punch ...

, and

cricket Cricket is a Bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball game played between two Sports team, teams of eleven players on a cricket field, field, at the centre of which is a cricket pitch, pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two Bail (cr ...

. On 19 January 2024, it was announced that the channel would close on 25 January.

Premier Sports Asia Premier Sports Asia is a pay television sports channel operating in the Asia Pacific region owned by Premier Media Broadcasting. It primarily airs the sport of rugby union. History The channel, a sister channel of Irish-based Premier Sports, wa ...

was launched on 22 October 2020 as an over-the-top (OTT) streaming channel for select Asian regions. The channel is also available as a traditional linear channel (branded as Premier Sports) replacing the RugbyPass TV channel for select Asian countries in late 2021. It takes over some of the rights to air competitions previously held by RugbyPass TV. Unlike the parent channel, Premier Sports Asia only airs rugby union matches.

Coverage

Football

In 2014, Premier Sports began live coverage of the Belgian Pro League, with three matches from each round of fixtures. Premier Sports also broadcasts a selection of friendly matches during the football season, e.g.

New York Red Bulls The New York Red Bulls are an American professional association football, soccer club based in the New York metropolitan area. The Red Bulls compete in Major League Soccer (MLS) as a member of the Eastern Conference (MLS), Eastern Conferenc ...

against

Arsenal An arsenal is a place where arms and ammunition are made, maintained and repaired, stored, or issued, in any combination, whether privately or publicly owned. Arsenal and armoury (British English) or armory (American English) are mostly ...

in 2014 or all

International Champions Cup The International Champions Cup (ICC) was an annual club association football (soccer) official competition staged from 2013 to 2019. COVID-19 resulted in the 2020 edition being cancelled. The tournament was later abolished, but the Women's I ...

matches not involving

Manchester United Manchester United Football Club, commonly referred to as Man United (often stylised as Man Utd) or simply United, is a professional association football, football club based in Old Trafford (area), Old Trafford, Greater Manchester, Engl ...

Liverpool Liverpool is a port City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. It is situated on the eastern side of the River Mersey, Mersey Estuary, near the Irish Sea, north-west of London. With a population ...

. In May 2015, Premier Sports announced it had won exclusive multi-year rights to all 26 games of

Copa América The CONMEBOL Copa América (; known until 1975 as the South American Football Championship), often simply called the Copa America, is the top men's quadrennial association football, football tournament contested among list of men's national ass ...

(including

Copa América Centenario The Copa América Centenario (, , ; literally ''Centennial America Cup'') was an international men's soccer tournament that was hosted by the United States in 2016. The competition was a celebration of the centennial of CONMEBOL and the Copa Am� ...

in 2016), starting from the

2015 Copa América The 2015 Copa América was the 44th edition of the Copa América, the main international football tournament for national teams in South America, and took place in Chile between 11 June and 4 July 2015. The competition was organized by CONMEBOL, ...

that ran between 11 June and 4 July. Premier Sports shows

UEFA Champions League The UEFA Champions League (UCL) is an annual club association football competition organised by the UEFA, Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) that is contested by List of top-division football clubs in UEFA countries, top-divisio ...

and

UEFA Europa League The UEFA Europa League (UEL), usually known simply as the Europa League, is an annual association football, football club competition organised since 1971 by the UEFA, Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) for eligible European footb ...

qualifiers that include British teams, including Shkëndija versus

Aberdeen Aberdeen ( ; ; ) is a port city in North East Scotland, and is the List of towns and cities in Scotland by population, third most populous Cities of Scotland, Scottish city. Historically, Aberdeen was within the historic county of Aberdeensh ...

in July 2015. In June 2018, it was announced Premier Sports had won rights to start broadcasting

English Premier League The Premier League is a professional association football league in England and the highest level of the English football league system. Contested by 20 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion and relegation with the English Football Lea ...

games on the Saturday 3 p.m. slot exclusively to viewers in Ireland from the start of the 2019-20 season, taking over from

. Eoin McDevitt hosts coverage alongside studio pundits, Damien Delaney,

Richard Dunne Richard Patrick Dunne (born 21 September 1979) is an Irish former professional footballer and current television pundit for TNT Sports, who played as a centre-back. He made 431 Premier League appearances, including 253 for Manchester City. Du ...

, Kenny Cunningham and

David Moyes David William Moyes (born 25 April 1963) is a Scottish professional Manager (association football), football manager and former Association football, player, who currently manages Premier League club Everton F.C., Everton. He was the 2003, 200 ...

. The lead commentator is Des Curran,

Clive Tyldesley Clive Tyldesley (born 21 August 1954) is an English television sports broadcaster. He was ITV's senior football commentator from 1998 until 2020. In that role, he led the ITV commentary team at five World Cups and five European Championships an ...

or Will Downing with Gary Breen or Brian Kerr the co-commentators. In November 2018, Premier Sports announced a 6-year deal with the SFA starting in 2019 to air the

Scottish Cup The Scottish Football Association Challenge Cup,Scottish League Cup The Scottish League Cup, also known as the Premier Sports Cup for sponsorship reasons, is a football competition open to all Scottish Professional Football League (SPFL) clubs. First held in 1946–47, it is the oldest national League cup in ...

, currently known as the Premier Sports Cup for sponsorship reasons, for the next five years and will exclusively broadcast between 12 and 16 live Betfred Cup (the Scottish League Cup) matches and highlights per season, starting with the 2020–2021 season. In January 2019, Premier Sports had secured rights to the Dutch Eredivisie and the Chinese Super League after Eleven Sports cancelled the competition rights. In February 2019, it was announced that Premier Sports had secured

rights in the UK & Ireland, showing 4 live matches per round from matchday 25 until the end of the 2018/2019 season. Premier Sports also broadcast weekly highlights, previews and magazine shows. Leading on from this, in September, Premier Sports confirmed that they had become exclusive UK rights-holders to La Liga, starting with matchday 4 of the 2019–20 season until the end of the 2021–22 season. They added that most matches would be put on the LaLigaTV channel, which would become available to all existing Premier Sports subscribers on the Premier Player from October, and on Sky by January 2020. One match per round would be broadcast live on sister free-to-air channel FreeSports.

Gaelic games

Premier Sports currently has exclusive British TV rights to approximately 75%

Gaelic Athletic Association The Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA; ; CLG) is an Irish international amateur sports, amateur sporting and cultural organisation, focused primarily on promoting indigenous Gaelic games and pastimes, which include the traditional Irish sports o ...

games broadcast live

Gaelic games Gaelic games () are a set of sports played worldwide, though they are particularly popular in Ireland, where they originated. They include Gaelic football, hurling, Gaelic handball and rounders. Football and hurling, the most popular of the s ...

, including all matches from packs 2,3,4,7,8 & 9 from the Championships, All televised

National Football League The National Football League (NFL) is a Professional gridiron football, professional American football league in the United States. Composed of 32 teams, it is divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National ...

and

National Hurling League The National Hurling League is an annual Inter county, inter-county hurling competition featuring teams from Ireland and England. Founded in 1925 by the Gaelic Athletic Association, it operates on a system of promotion and relegation within the l ...

, the Irish-hosted versions of the

International Rules Series The International Rules Series is a senior men's international rules football competition between the Australia international rules football team (selected by the Australian Football League) and the Ireland international rules football team ...

between

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

and

, and also the rights to show archived classic

Gaelic football Gaelic football (; short name '')'', commonly known as simply Gaelic, GAA, or football, is an Irish team sport. A form of football, it is played between two teams of 15 players on a rectangular grass pitch. The objective of the sport is to score ...

and

hurling Hurling (, ') is an outdoor Team sport, team game of ancient Gaelic culture, Gaelic Irish origin, played by men and women. One of Ireland's native Gaelic games, it shares a number of features with Gaelic football, such as the field and goa ...

matches in Great Britain.

Ice hockey

Premier Sports broadcast at least 15 NHL games a week. On 12 October 2011, Premier Sports announced that they would broadcast up to 10 live

National Hockey League The National Hockey League (NHL; , ''LNH'') is a professional ice hockey league in North America composed of 32 teams25 in the United States and 7 in Canada. The NHL is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United States and Cana ...

games per week from the 2011–12 season. On 5 July 2012, Premier Sport's announced on their Facebook page that NHL would continue for a further 4 years on the channel with appropriately 400 games per season being broadcast and complemented by daily coverage of Hockey Tonight. This deal was later extended until 2021. The channel also broadcasts weekly games of the

Swedish Hockey League The Swedish Hockey League (SHL; ) is a professional ice hockey league in Sweden and the highest level of the ice hockey in Sweden, Swedish ice hockey system. The league currently consists of 14 teams. The league was founded in 1975, and while Li ...

(SHL) as well as games from the

Kontinental Hockey League The Kontinental Hockey League (KHL; ) is an international professional ice hockey league founded in 2008. It comprises member clubs based in Russia (20), Belarus (1), Kazakhstan (1), and China (1) for a total of 23 clubs. It was considered in ...

(KHL). Premier Sports also broadcasts live coverage of the

Ice Hockey World Championships The Ice Hockey World Championships are an annual international men's ice hockey tournament organized by the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF), first officially held at the 1920 Summer Olympics. The IIHF was created in 1908 while the I ...

Motorsport

Premier Sports broadcasts all 38 weeks of racing from the

NASCAR Cup Series The NASCAR Cup Series is the top racing series of the NASCAR, National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing (NASCAR), the most prestigious stock car racing series in the United States. The series began in 1949 as the Strictly Stock Division, ...

. In a one-off deal,

Kimi Räikkönen Kimi-Matias Räikkönen (; born 17 October 1979), nicknamed "the Iceman", is a Finnish racing driver who competed in Formula One between 2001 and 2021 for Sauber, McLaren, Ferrari, Lotus, and Alfa Romeo. Räikkönen won the 2007 Formula One ...

NASCAR Truck Series The NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series is a pickup truck racing series owned and operated by the NASCAR, National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing (NASCAR), and is the only series in NASCAR to race production pickup truck-based stock car racing, s ...

debut was broadcast live and free-to-view. During the final week of the 2011 NASCAR season, in addition to the main

race, Premier Sports showed the final races in the

Nationwide Series The NASCAR Xfinity Series (NXS) is a stock car racing series organized by NASCAR. It is promoted as NASCAR's second-tier circuit to the organization's top level Cup Series. NXS events are frequently held as a support race on the day prior to a ...

and the Truck Series live, commercial free and free-to-view. On 6 February 2018, Premier Sports announced on their Twitter page that they would continue to broadcast the

for five more years. In 2018 Premier Sports, and its sister channel Freesports, broadcast live and also highlights of the speedway leagues Sweden's Elitserien and the Polish PGE Ekstraliga.

Rugby Union

Premier Sports airs France's autumn internationals since 2016, and Italy's from 2018. On 30 April 2018, Premier Sports announced they had signed a landmark partnership with PRO14 Rugby to broadcast every game from the Guinness PRO14 live in high-definition across the UK and ROI for the next three years. The agreement starting from the 2018–19 season will see all 152 games per season broadcast live, with no less than 21 games (one per round) shown live free-to-air on

. On 26 May 2021, Premier Sports announced they will begin broadcasting the

Top 14 The Top 14 () is a professional rugby union club competition that is played in France. Created in 1892, the Top 14 is at the top of the national league system operated by the National Rugby League (France), France National Rugby League, also ...

for two seasons. On 9 December 2022, Viaplay Sports started showing

European Professional Club Rugby European Professional Club Rugby (EPCR) is the governing body and organiser of the two major club rugby union tournaments: the European Rugby Champions Cup and the EPCR Challenge Cup. A third tournament, the European Rugby Challenge Cup Qualifyin ...

's second-tier competition, the

EPCR Challenge Cup The EPCR Challenge Cup is an annual rugby union competition organised by European Professional Club Rugby (EPCR). It is the second-tier competition for clubs based in European leagues behind the European Rugby Champions Cup. From its inception i ...

. The two-season contract was Viaplay's first major rights acquisition since it took over Premier Sports earlier in 2022.

Rugby League

The channel broadcast live coverage of the

, alongside the BBC's coverage of England games. The channel also covered live coverage of the

2017 2017 was designated as the International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development by the United Nations General Assembly. Events January * January 1 – Istanbul nightclub shooting: A gunman dressed as Santa Claus opens fire at the ...

event. Premier Sports also provides full coverage of the Four Nations championship. Premier Sports showed all

Toronto Wolfpack Toronto Wolfpack RLFC is a Canadian professional rugby league club based in Toronto, Ontario. The club is the first and only professional rugby league club in North America, and as of 2023 competes in the self sponsored Canada Cup, an invitation ...

games in League 1 in 2017 and all Toronto games in the

Championship In sport, a championship is a competition in which the aim is to decide which individual or team is the champion. Championship systems Various forms of competition can be referred to by the term championship. Title match system In this sys ...

during 2018. In October 2021, the channel agreed a two-year deal with the

Rugby Football League The Rugby Football League (RFL) is the governing body for rugby league in England. Founded in 1895 as the Northern Rugby Football Union following 22 clubs resigning from the Rugby Football Union, it changed its name in 1922 to the Rugby Footb ...

for coverage of matches from the

RFL Championship The Rugby Football League Championship, (known as the Betfred Championship for sponsorship reasons) is the second highest division of rugby league in British rugby league system, Britain (with one team in the league also being based in France) ...

and the

Challenge Cup The Rugby Football League Challenge Cup, commonly known just as the Challenge Cup is a Single-elimination tournament, knockout rugby league cup competition organised by the Rugby Football League, held annually since 1896, it is the world's old ...

. The Championship games will include the

Summer Bash The Summer Bash is an annual event organised by the Rugby Football League. An entire round of Championship matches are played in a city to showcase the sport of rugby league. It was held at Bloomfield Road, Blackpool from 2015 to 2019. Concep ...

and the play-off games.

Professional Wrestling

On 2 October 2020, Premier Sports announced a new partnership with

Impact Wrestling Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (abbreviated as TNA Wrestling or TNA) is an American professional wrestling promotion based in Nashville, Tennessee. It is a subsidiary of Anthem Sports & Entertainment, a Canadian media company owned by busine ...

that will see future Impact

pay-per-view Pay-per-view (PPV) is a type of pay television or webcast service that enables a viewer to pay to watch individual events via private telecast. Events can be purchased through a multichannel television platform using their electronic program ...

s and special events broadcast on the channel, starting with Victory Road on delay on 6 October 2020. The partnership also sees Impact's weekly programme '' Impact!'' broadcast every Wednesday on

Previous coverage

Bowls

On 9 November 2012, it was announced that Premier Sports would broadcast 260 hours of Indoor

Bowls Bowls, also known as lawn bowls or lawn bowling, is a sport in which players try to roll their ball (called a bowl) closest to a smaller ball (known as a "jack" or sometimes a "kitty"). The bowls are shaped (biased), so that they follow a curve ...

in 2013. The deal includes coverage of the World Bowls Tour International Open, PBA Masters, National Under-25s, EIBA Singles Finals, England Internationals, World Pairs and Premier Threes events.

Boxing

From September 2010, Premier Sports began to air a number of live boxing events, featuring the likes of

Lucian Bute Lucian Bute (born February 28, 1980) is a Romanian-Canadian former professional boxer who competed from 2003 to 2017. He held the IBF super-middleweight title from 2007 to 2012. Personal life Lucian Bute was born on February 28, 1980, in Peche ...

Érik Morales Erik Isaac Morales Elvira (born September 1, 1976) is a Mexican former professional boxer who competed from 1993 to 2012. He is the first Mexico-born boxer in history to win world championships in four weight classes, ranging from super bantam ...

Shane Mosley Shane Mosley (born September 7, 1971), often known by his nickname "Sugar" Shane Mosley, is an American former professional boxer who competed from 1993 to 2016. He held multiple triple champion, world championships in three weight classes, incl ...

and Felix Sturm. On 8 December 2010, Premier Sports announced an exclusive UK deal with AIBI for the

World Series of Boxing 250px, LA Matadors vs. Moscow Dynamo in Hollywood, CA on 4 December 2011. Both amateur boxers compete without vests or head guards. The World Series of Boxing or WSB was an international boxing tournament that allowed amateur boxers to compete p ...

starting from December. In February 2011, Premier Sports announced they would air all ShoBox: The New Generation events in 2011 and access Gary Shaw's archive of world title fights from the past five years. Premier Sports will also air eight

Top Rank Top Rank, Inc. is a boxing promotional company founded by Jabir Herbert Muhammad and Bob Arum, which was incorporated in 1973, and is based in Las Vegas, Nevada. Since its founding, Top Rank has promoted many world class fighters, including M ...

events in 2011–2012. On 14 August 2011, the channel signed a deal with Spencer Fearon's Hard Knocks Boxing Promotions that saw six events from

York Hall The York Hall, officially known as York Hall Leisure Centre, is a multi-purpose indoor arena and leisure centre in Bethnal Green, London. The building opened in 1929 and it is most famous as an international boxing venue with the first nights o ...

broadcast live, starting on 7 October 2011.

Darts

From 30 May 2018, Premier Sports aired all 5 days of action for the 2018 BDO World Trophy, which took place at

Preston Guild Hall Preston Guild Hall is an entertainment venue in Preston, Lancashire, England, which opened in 1973. History The Guild Hall was commissioned to replace the town's Public Hall. The new building, which was designed by Robert Matthew, Johnson Mar ...

in Preston. Later in the year, 2 England Darts events were shown.

Football

Premier Sports has from time to time aired football from the

League of Ireland The League of Ireland is a national association football Sports league, league consisting of professional clubs in the Republic of Ireland and Derry, Derry City in Northern Ireland. It is governed by the Football Association of Ireland. It was ...

. Since 2011 the channel has broadcast footballing action from South America. The

Copa Libertadores The CONMEBOL Libertadores, also known as Copa Libertadores de América (), is an annual continental club football competition organized by CONMEBOL since 1960. It is the highest level of competition in South American club football. The tournam ...

was televised exclusively on the channel, with thirty-five live games, plus a weekly highlights package until 2016. Premier Sports also aired thirty matches from the

Copa Sudamericana The CONMEBOL Sudamericana, also known as Copa Sudamericana (; ), is an annual international club football competition organized by CONMEBOL, the governing body of football in South America, since 2002. It is the second-most prestigious club com ...

(until 2016), seventy-four matches from the

Campeonato Brasileiro Série A The Campeonato Brasileiro Série A (; English: "Brazilian Championship A Series"), commonly referred to as the Brasileirão (; English: "Big Brazilian" or "Great Brazilian"), the Série A or the Brazilian Série A (to distinguish it from the I ...

and

Campeonato Paulista The Campeonato Paulista Série A1, commonly known as Campeonato Paulista, nicknamed Paulistão, is the top-flight professional state football league in the Brazilian state of São Paulo. Run by the São Paulo State Football Federation (FPF), ...

as well as seventy-six matches from the

Argentine Primera División The Primera División (; ), known officially as Liga Profesional de Fútbol, or Torneo Betano for sponsorship reasons, is a professional association football league in Argentina and the highest level of the Argentine football league system. Organ ...

. In January 2012, it was announced that

Celtic TV Celtic TV is a British premium streaming service devoted to coverage of the Scottish football club Celtic F.C. From 2004-2009, Celtic TV existed as a sports television channel operated by Irish Sports broadcasting company Setanta Sports. Hist ...

and

Rangers TV Rangers TV is a British premium streaming service devoted to coverage of the Scottish football club Rangers F.C. From 2004-2009, Rangers TV existed as a sports television channel operated by Irish sports broadcasting company Setanta Sports. H ...

would each air as a three-hour block on Monday evenings. Coverage included full replays of the weekends matches that were not aired live on Sky Sports or ESPN, pre and post-match analysis and classic archive footage. The channel had the rights to broadcast the

Northern Ireland national football team The Northern Ireland national football team represents Northern Ireland in men's international association football. From 1882 to 1950, all of Ireland was represented by a single side, the Ireland national football team (1882–1950), Ireland ...

's home friendlies until 2018. In July 2016 Premier Sports became one of the broadcasters of the revamped

Scottish Challenge Cup The Scottish Professional Football League Challenge Cup,Irn-Bru Irn-Bru ( "iron brew", ) is a Scottish carbonated soft drink, often described as "Scotland's other national drink" after Scotch whisky. Introduced in 1901, the drink is produced in Westfield, Cumbernauld, North Lanarkshire, by A.G. Barr of ...

sharing the rights with

BBC Alba BBC Alba is a Scottish Gaelic-language free-to-air public broadcast television channel jointly owned by the BBC and MG Alba. The channel was launched on 19 September 2008 and is on-air for up to seven hours a day. The name ' is the Scottish Gae ...

and

S4C S4C (, ''Sianel Pedwar Cymru'', meaning ''Channel Four Wales'') is a Welsh language free-to-air public broadcast television channel. Launched on 1 November 1982, it was the first television channel to be aimed specifically at a Welsh-speakin ...

, but only held the rights for one season. In January 2019, it was announced that Premier Sports had secured rights to

Serie A The Serie A (), officially known as Serie A Enilive in Italy and Serie A Made in Italy abroad for sponsorship reasons, is a professional association football league in Italy and the highest tier of the Italian football league system. Establish ...

in the UK & Ireland until 2021 with a minimum of 6 games per round being shown on Premier Sports as well as a number of games live on sister free-to-air channel

. However, after the deal came to an end, the rights to Italy's top football league were bought by BT Sport.

Conference National

On 19 August 2010, Premier Sports announced that it had bought the live and exclusive television rights to thirty matches per season from the

Conference National The National League, officially known as Vanarama National League for sponsorship reasons, is a professional association football league in England. The National League is the first division of the National League (English football), National Le ...

for a total of three seasons, covering the

2010–11 1 (one, unit, unity) is a number, numeral, and glyph. It is the first and smallest positive integer of the infinite sequence of natural numbers. This fundamental property has led to its unique uses in other fields, ranging from science to sp ...

, 2011–12 and

2012–13 1 (one, unit, unity) is a number, numeral, and glyph. It is the first and smallest positive integer of the infinite sequence of natural numbers. This fundamental property has led to its unique uses in other fields, ranging from science to sp ...

seasons. The thirty matches selected for broadcast included all five Conference National play-offs. The deal with the

Football Conference The National League of English Football Clubs is a professional Association football, football league in England that consists of 72 teams, divided equally between the National League (division), National League North and National League South ...

was a revenue sharing arrangement whereby clubs would receive 50% of revenue from subscriptions, on top of the normal rights fee paid by the broadcaster, once the costs of production had been met. The Conference would also earn 50% from all internet revenue associated with the deal and retain advertising rights allied to those adverts shown with their matches. However, Premier Sports announced on Facebook in April 2011 that the company had failed to attract enough viewers to its Conference football broadcasts to share any revenue with the clubs beyond the £5,000 broadcast fee paid to home clubs and £1,000 to away clubs. "It is a shame the number did not reach the point where revenue sharing became an option," said a Premier Sports spokesperson on its Facebook discussion board. In May 2013, the rights for the 2013–14 season were awarded to

BT Sport TNT Sports (formerly BT Sport) is a group of pay television sports channels in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland, Ireland. Now owned by Warner Bros. Discovery Sports Europe, Warner Bros. Discovery and BT Group, they first launched as B ...

Greyhound racing

In November 2011, Premier Sports agreed to broadcast five nights of free-to-air coverage from the Greyhound Premier League, up to grand finals night in February 2012.

Handball

On 3 October 2012, the

European Handball Federation The European Handball Federation (EHF) is the umbrella organisation for European handball. Founded on 17 November 1991, it is made of 50 member federations and two associated federations (England and Scotland), and is headquartered in Vienna, Au ...

announced that Premier Sports had acquired the rights to the

EHF Champions League The EHF Champions League is the most important club handball competition for men's teams in Europe and involves the leading teams from the top European nations. The competition is organised every year by EHF. The official name for the men's com ...

and would be broadcasting one game per week in full either live or delayed as well as the weekly highlights package.

Mixed martial arts

In March 2011, Premier Sports and

Cage Warriors Cage Warriors (CW) is an Irish-owned mixed martial arts (MMA) promotion company based in London, England. The promotion was established in 2001 and staged its first MMA event in London in July, 2002. Many MMA stars have made their names under ...

announced a partnership that would see the final eight Cage Warriors events planned for 2011 being broadcast live and available

free-to-view Free-to-view (FTV) is a term used for audiovisual transmissions that are provided free without any form of continual subscription. It differs from free-to-air (FTA) in that the program is encrypted. Free-to-view vs. free-to-air The free-to-vie ...

on the channel. On 15 August 2011, UFC Live: Hardy vs. Lytle was shown free-to-view on Premier Sports, in addition to free coverage on UFC.tv. A similar deal was put in place for UFC Live: Cruz vs. Johnson on 2 October 2011 and UFC on Fox: Velasquez vs. Dos Santos on 13 November 2011. On 31 December 2012 Glory Sports International promoted their Dream 18 & Glory 4 Tokyo ~ Special 2012 ~ New Year's Eve card from the

Saitama Super Arena is a multi-purpose indoor arena located in Chūō-ku, Saitama, Chūō-ku, Saitama (city), Saitama, Saitama Prefecture, Japan. It opened preliminarily on May 5, 2000, and then was officially opened on September 1 of the same year. Its maximum capa ...

Saitama, Japan is the capital and largest city of Saitama Prefecture, Japan. Its area incorporates the former cities of Urawa, Ōmiya, Yono and Iwatsuki. It is a city designated by government ordinance. , the city had an estimated population of 1,324,854 ...

. The event was broadcast live and available free-to-view on the channel.

Motorsport

Premier Sports aired all 24 weeks of the Swedish Elite League Speedway live in 2011, with a two-year extension announced in April 2012. The channel aired twenty dates from the 2011

BriSCA F1 Stock Cars BriSCA Formula 1 Stock Cars is a class of single seater, single-seater Stock car racing in the United Kingdom, stock-car-racing in the UK with custom-built cars, with races conducted on walled oval tracks of either shale or Asphalt concrete, tarm ...

season and exclusive highlights of the

series during the second half of the 2011 season. In January 2012, Premier Sports signed a 2-year extension with BriSCA F1 for highlights from 24 races per season.

Rugby League

On 18 October 2011, it was announced that up to 32 games from the

, Championship 1 and

Championship Cup The Championship Cup (known as the Northern Rail Cup for sponsorship reasons), previously known as the National League Cup, was a rugby league football competition for clubs in the United Kingdom's Rugby League Championships. Although the Frenc ...

were televised live by Premier Sports in the 2012 season. Matches were mainly screened on Thursday night with the possibility of a number of double headers. There was one game shown live from the Championship or Championship 1 in each of the regular rounds and at least three play-off games were televised as well as both the Championship and Championship 1 finals. One game from the Championship Cup quarter-finals and semi-finals will be shown live as well as the final. Premier Sports aired all 201 games of

from the Australian

National Rugby League The National Rugby League (also known as the NRL Telstra Premiership for sponsorship reasons) is a professional rugby league competition in Oceania which contains clubs from New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria (state), Victoria, the Austral ...

alongside the

NRL Footy Show ''The Footy Show'' was an Australian sports variety television program covering professional rugby league in Australia. It was shown on the Nine Network and aired for 25 seasons. For the final season in 2018, the show was hosted by journalist Eri ...

State of Origin series The State of Origin series is an annual best-of-three rugby league series between two States and territories of Australia, Australian state representative sides, the New South Wales rugby league team, New South Wales Blues and the Queensland ru ...

, ''NRL Full Time'' and'' Rugby League Back Chat'' until 2017. In January 2011, Premier Sports agreed a deal for live coverage of five games from the

Student Rugby League The University and College Rugby League (UCRL), formerly known as ''the Student Rugby League'', is the organisation which administrates university and college rugby league football in the United Kingdom, on behalf of the Rugby Football League and B ...

's Super 8 competition on a

basis. The channel also covers the State of Origin series. In July 2012, Premier Sports broadcast the Anglo-French Challenge matches between

Leigh Centurions The Leigh Leopards are a professional rugby league club based in Leigh, Greater Manchester, England. Leigh play homes games at Leigh Sports Village and compete in Super League, the top tier of British rugby league system, British rugby league. ...

and Avignon XIII and

Featherstone Rovers Featherstone Rovers are a professional rugby league club in Featherstone, West Yorkshire, England. The club play home games at Post Office Road and currently compete in the Championship, the second tier of British rugby league. Featherstone ...

and Pia XIII, the later was broadcast free-to-air.

Rugby Union

On 17 August 2012, Premier Sports announced it had the rights to the French

league, usually broadcasting two live games per round. These rights transferred to

for the 2013–14 season.

References

External links

{{commons category
Official website
Television channels and stations established in 2009 Sports television networks Sports television channels in the United Kingdom Sports television in the United Kingdom 2009 establishments in the United Kingdom