November 5, 2025 • 45 mins
DAZN’s move to absorb FIFA+, Apple’s $750 million bid for Formula 1, and LaLiga’s struggle to stay relevant — this episode unpacks the business stories behind the biggest headlines.
Co-hosts SportsPro's CEO Nick Meacham, and Community Lead Chris Stone dissect what these deals reveal about the global sports rights landscape, evolving streaming strategies, and the growing “squeezed middle” of leagues caught between the giants.
Key points:
- Was FIFA’s deal with DAZN driven by strategy or financial pressure?
- How much influence does Saudi Arabia’s SURJ investment have on DAZN?
- Can Formula 1 continue to grow without ESPN’s editorial reach?
- Why is Apple’s investment a smart long-term play?
- What do LaLiga President Javier Tebas’s comments about pan-European deals reveal about the state of media rights in Europe?
- Are we entering an era where only the biggest leagues can survive?
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:04):
Hello everyone, welcome back to the next episode of Stream Time
Sports. My name is Chris Stone, the
community lead, joined as alwaysby our CEO Nick Meacham.
Now, Nick, as a recording this Isaw a statistic which actually
feels a bit crazy to not that it's, you know, this is the
case, but apparently the San Antonio Spurs for the first time
in franchise history have started 5 and O given the
success that that franchise has had, it seems a bit crazy to
(00:26):
think they've not started a season 5 and O.
But kind of the reason I'm reaching is that have you
watched any of the highlights ofWembe this year so far?
I have seen a few of the the highlights and it is like one of
those things you've seen at highschool where like the year, I
don't know, the year 12 kid, the17 year old kid starts to play
pick up ball with the 13 year olds and just bullies them.
Like it's unbelievable. It is truly, I mean, it's always
(00:50):
been this build up for the last couple of years about how good
he is. But to see that now, whatever he
did, that that, that that was it.
Shaolin Monk Temple. Yeah, it's clearly paid off
because he's he's up to the nextlevel, that's for sure.
It's just like when in a video game you can build a player and
like, you just build a player. That's just unrealistic.
Like it's literally what it is. Like he's dunking without
(01:11):
leaving the ground. It's just like you shouldn't be
able to do all these things at that size.
Yeah, I remember playing some video games and when I was
younger and when that custom player building thing became a
thing and having a lot of fun with that.
Where you'd build in in the NFL Madden game, I built like a 7
foot 6 running back just becauseit looks stupid and it was a bit
funny and tried it with a bunch of other different sports as
(01:34):
well. Like, yeah, but you can change
obviously players like Messi to from his little 5 foot, I know 5
foot 7 to to being 7 foot behemoth if you can customise
the settings. But it is a whole different
world. I was actually talking to the
NBA yesterday on the prep call for our media summit session
that we're running next month, and they were just waxing
(01:58):
lyrical about how impactful, notonly how amazing he is, but how
impactful it is just to the fandom around the NBA globally.
It is really got everyone payingattention and to the incredible
story, you know, like from from day one.
And even when you heard him talking before we got drafted,
you just knew he wasn't going tofail.
Like the only thing that could fail him is his body breaking
(02:21):
down basically, I think. And he's he's proven that he can
take another gear from where he was last year.
Yeah, and it's important thing for the NBA.
You know, we talked about it all, all the time.
Celebrity driven, you know, athletes and things like that.
I think there probably is that question.
You know, Lebron's maybe got a year or two left and, you know,
Katie's never quite reached thatlevel of LeBron to start him.
Like Steph Curry's only got a couple more years left.
(02:42):
Like there's always that question of like, who's going to
take it over? You know, Patrick Mahomes took
the throne from Tom Brady a little bit and you know, who was
going to be that next person, you know, once LeBron stepped
away. So, yeah, it just, it it seems
very well prepared and like having to be international, I'm
sure helps like, and as you say,like, he's incredibly well
spoken. Like yeah.
(03:03):
I mean, I it, it seems a pretty fortunate thing for the NBA to
be saying goodbye to LeBron and,you know, Steph Curry and Katie
and some of those guys and sort of welcoming in a new era of
Wendy. Yeah.
I'm amazed at how. Personal or how much of I guess
just he, he, when he, when I first heard him speak a couple
of years ago, obviously he's, he's come from France, typically
(03:24):
French and their English is a little bit not quite as advanced
as perhaps others in terms of being able to speak it
eloquently and become a, a face and a brand.
But within a few months, I couldsee that he put so much effort
in and you heard that thick American twang coming through
his his interviews and he's really grown as this personality
alongside that. So and he's got a real, what do
(03:46):
you call it, like a clean image,which I think the league would
love. They don't want.
It's nice to have a couple of like bad boys in your Iverson's
and those types of players that have come through.
But he just gives them somethingthat they can hang their hats
on. Again, fingers crossed that he
holds his body holds up for the for the next decade or so,
because that is, I really think,the only thing that's going to
(04:06):
stop someone like him. Yeah, that's just you're not
going to see anybody defend him,but moving on.
I would say just quickly for anyone who isn't a fan of the
NBA but isn't a fan of basketball, just go and check it
out because it is a different, it is a different thing.
It's one of those things that I don't know, you can think of
other sports where like Tiger Woods brought, you know, brought
(04:27):
fans to golf because he was doing something that no one else
could do. I almost think if he can
continue this, that that sort oflevel of he's playing a
different game. He's changing the way the sport
is played. I mean, if you don't like
basketball, go check it out because it is something else.
Absolutely. He's generally that freaky.
But moving on to business stuff,Nick, we're going to start off.
There's a few new juicy stories.They they include, you know,
(04:47):
talking about some of the streaming platforms that we've
all been talking about and following.
So we'll kind of jump just straight into a little bit,
Nick. We're going to talk about FIFA
and the Zone. We talked about kind of what a
big accomplishment it was for FIFA to launch the FIFA plus
platform at the time that they did.
We talked about how, you know, we appreciated it, the idea of
(05:09):
it being sort of an ad supportive model, free access.
We knew that it wasn't going to have like the big major games,
but it was a good way to democratise content around the
globe and just the scale of it. I mean, what they do something
like 40,000 games or something like that and they're.
Something like. That it was a really, you know,
incredible number given what it was.
We also know that FIFA's got therelationship with the zone from
(05:30):
the Club World Cup. There's also talking about the
the money funding from Saudi Arabia, which is, you know,
being invested into the zone. But there's also, you know, the
World Cup being hosted in Saudi Arabia.
I think. What is that in 2034, 2020, 34?
Yeah, it's somewhere along thoselines.
(05:51):
Largely it is 2034, Nick, because US is 2026.
The 2031 is the one that's goingto be hosted in like 3 different
continents as an excuse to then go back to Saudi Arabia in 2034.
So there, there's all those tiesin there as well.
But it's now been announced thatThe Zone is going to continue to
add another streaming platform onto its existing platform.
(06:13):
You know, NFL Game Pass, NHL, they've been doing this approach
of basically onboarding other people's platforms into their
own and FIFA Plus will now be the next platform to be hosted
on the Zone network. I suppose we can call it now.
Yeah, it's. It's an interesting journey to
get to this point and a fascinating deal to see come to
life. We I heard, I think this first
(06:35):
got preliminarily announced justafter the Club World Cup, right?
And when I heard the announcement, the first thing I
did, I reached out to both sidesand said, well, does this mean
that the actual stand alone product will cease to exist?
And I did it again this time around.
And both of them are saying you'll have to wait and see
basically, which I find really just bizarre.
(06:57):
Are they what, what's the concern about just making it
clear what's going to happen. One thing some things I heard
through the industry was basically a deal was agreed very
swiftly between both parties andnow they're still trying to work
out what happens and that that whether that's true or not, I
don't know. Other speculation that I will
(07:18):
speculate on is, is this a extension of the Club World Cup
deal was already pre agreed, which goes against the other
other point. But let's just say that that's a
question. Is this a like a supplementary
thing that's been added in because maybe the Club World Cup
didn't deliver the value or relative to the revenue that to
(07:41):
zone expected from It is an interesting thing to consider.
Is this a step for zone to get get further embedded with FIFA?
So when the World Cups come along, the next one, subsequent
ones, they're going to be a better chance of basically
actually getting some of those premium World Cup rights.
(08:01):
Lots of questions about the whole deal in itself and I am
taking a step back. The FIFA Plus product in the
proposition, what I loved about when it launched, yes, it was
free to access, but it was also democratising and giving access
to all those under resourced, underdeveloped countries and
federations as part of FIFA to be able to get their games
(08:21):
broadcast and streamed and available to fans in their
markets but also globally. People don't underestimate how
big that was for I think some ofthe the lower tier countries to
have that capability. But the challenge has always
been about this monetization challenge.
If they had launched this without this massive price tag
hanging over it's head, whether it's this billion dollar number
(08:43):
that that Infantino suggested that it's that we're going to
get investment for a few years back or and it was just going to
be an extension and an initiative and sorry.
And I would say add to that, that what I was hearing was that
there was a lot of reassurance, I won't say promises, there are
reassurance that FIFA was going to use this as a revenue driver,
(09:06):
that that money was going to getthen distributed to all the
member associations. And if none of those things are
really happening to the level they expected, that's probably
where this has been. There's been not much choice
other than let's cut all the costs away from running this
platform, hand it over to Zone, who's an expert at these sorts
(09:28):
of things. We'll be able to basically keep
keep the lights on and keep thisplatform alive in some capacity
and some variation of it, what it would have meant to be.
And they're happy because they've got now the FIFA brand
associated with the Zone, givingthem more of a global audience.
Although again, like you said atthe start, the media rights
(09:49):
they've acquired is gonna be marginal.
It's it was actually a really small part of the entire release
was oh, and you'll get live matches available.
Yeah. The rest was all about all the
other editorial and non live content you'll get.
So it's going to be a hub. It's going to be focused around
content. Live will be one part of it, but
it won't be the they won't be like the the new destination for
(10:11):
everyone to go to consume fever stuff in there the same way it
could be if they started to put some more premium stuff in
there. So I'm not sure how I feel about
it all really. Yeah, it's kind of like if you
put two pies together, the the amount of games that were on
FIFA Plus is actually the majority of the pie.
But the games that are actually worth something are actually the
very small minority of the pie. So that's where it's I guess a
(10:33):
little bit, I don't want to say misleading, but like it just
needs to be understood. Like, yes, that 40,000 number is
really impressive, but actually that 40,000 number probably
really actually isn't worth evenmaybe 1% of 1% of like what the
World Cup is going to be worth. So it's sort of like there's
that dichotomy between what's actually being offered versus
what's actually people broadcastshould be willing to pay for.
(10:55):
100% and you know, they again, to emphasise the point, but this
was a real valuable proposition for those developing countries
who didn't have their capabilities to monetize and to
distribute the content. So basically the onus was on say
some of these countries, let's say I don't know an African
(11:16):
country, like I don't know, I'm going to say Senegal, just
random. I'm not sure how it advanced
their ecosystem and infrastructure is, but allow
them to have all they have to dois get the feed into FIFA's
ecosystem and they'll do the rest.
They'll get a broadcast line. They'll make the games
accessible for open to watch andthey can add that advertising
layer revenue, revenue generation to create some sort
(11:40):
of income for them, even if it is marginal.
But just having the games visible for people across the
world. It also was allowing those
lesser countries to have their teams and and potential talent
available because you know how much transfers are worth, right?
And scouting's worth in that sort of thing, like imagine if
more of that was being democratised and more junior
(12:01):
stars from in, in countries and regions like Africa and Asia
were being easily accessible to other pro clubs and teams as
well. That was another way that they
could generate income. Just think if they sell one
player at a decent level, that'sit.
That could be game changer for some of these lower tier clubs
and, and nations. So or I'm not sure what the
future of that holds. Like is that going to be
something that's still going to be available or I the kind of
(12:24):
sense and fear that that might be put to the side because it's
not a kneel mover for the zone and they need to worry about
their own best interests would be my my guess.
But who knows what that that ultimate degree agreement and
what the end result will be. I'm not sure.
I'm sure they know. Yeah.
Well, that that's the interesting thing, right, is I
think the 1 billion is kind of what was reported as you know,
someone taking a equity stake inFIFA plus the zone is obviously
(12:47):
not paying a billion dollars forthis.
But to your point, they are going to take over the hardware
side of things in terms of the development, which isn't
nothing. But I don't again, I think it
just sort of clouds or muddies the water a little bit as to
what this transaction actually is because like you said, I've,
I couldn't tell you how much it cost to build a streaming
(13:09):
platform, but I assume it's lessthan a billion.
So like, I just sort of, I don'tknow, muddy's the waters a
little bit, I guess between likeit's clear what the zone is
offering. I just, I don't, yeah, I'm, I'm
scratching my eye a little bit too, Nick.
Yeah. But look, I think first, we know
it doesn't cost a lot to build aplatform on this.
But with the complexity of reaching all the different
nations and providing them services are what I understood.
(13:32):
It is basically a monetization driver for them, whether it's
enabling them to just have theircontent more available or just
to to create organic advertisingrevenue coming off this
platform. And it has not worked to
whatever the expectation I thinkhas said, at least from what I
can see from outside in. So look, yeah, if the designer
(13:53):
adds another layer to it, I haveno idea whether the designer
have had to pay a load for this.I'd be shocked if I had, unless
it's linked with some again, a bit like the Club World Cup deal
of links with, you know, one of the things that the Zone has
done quite successfully is extract a lot of value and and
support financially from obviously through surge from
(14:14):
Saudi Arabia, Riyadh Season became their premier, I don't
know, sponsor all the zone content.
If you remember that announcement a while ago and
Matchroom were in partnership with the zone running events out
of there and running their pay-per-view stuff from there
originally. And they're heavily linked with
the boxing side of things. So again, is this like just
(14:35):
basically another way for that, let's say for further revenue to
be out of be generated through the zone rather than having to
come through basically through means through Saudi means
directly through FIFA channels, which is a little bit more
complex and complicated. Again, I'm not sure what the
outcomes are, but that definitely opens up the door for
that types of those types of deals and monetization to be
(14:57):
made a little bit easier becausejust don't have to work.
Don't worry about all the complexities that come with
being in International Federation.
So we'll have to wait and see. The the other question I would
ask flipping it on the other side, is this this even in the
best interest of FIFA? And the way I'm going to phrase
this is we, the way we've sort of talked about FIFA plus it's
about accessibility. It's about it's a reach play
(15:19):
because it's there's no subscriptions.
It's simply about how many eyeballs can we get to try to
drive as much advertising? Is it only even the best place
for this? Like, would you argue and maybe
this goes to the point is a really quick deal?
You know, I don't know all the tech perspective, but like
obviously YouTube TV is launchedand the NFL Sunday tickets, so
they do have stuff like this on.Granted, it wouldn't be a
(15:39):
subscription like that, but if the goal is to get as many
eyeballs on as possible to zone possibly even the best option of
places for FIFA to try to put this platform.
Well, I mean, it all depends on where you draw the line and what
sort of content we're talking about, because obviously YouTube
and YouTube TV is pure video andwe'll definitely get bigger
audiences, but their emphasis was on all the other content
(16:02):
that comes with it. So the non live stuff there is
the editorial aspects of it. Maybe some of the fifa.com
coverage that they have around some of the other leagues might
be filtered into that as well. So it is they are trying to
build a hub. And like I said before, the live
part doesn't feel like it's as big a like a flagship component
(16:23):
of this deal as you might think it might be.
But it's not presented as such, at least from what I how I
digested some of that. So is it the best place for it?
I don't think I could think if they wanted to have this hub
concept, if if say FIFA suggested they wanted that, I
can't think of anyone else who would be a better partner for
them globally to do that type ofthing.
(16:44):
I'm not sure about the zones breadth on the editorial front
to like tell those stories and whether they would just be
funnelling FIFA content or doingit all themselves.
But I have seen them actually, Ithink hiring people in the
editorial roles and they're basically promoting some roles
in that team. So maybe that's all linked with
the same same initiative. But look, I think the zone
(17:08):
basically in the in the end, they get another little layer to
add to the mix. How needle moving is that for
everyone? I think they've got the also the
major challenge of educating everyone again in new markets is
the zone. Like the zone is not going to be
known in a lot of those again developing countries because
club or cup was only really relevant to those clubs that
(17:28):
were involved. So they still a lot of work to
do for visibility and awareness.So yeah, it's a bit of a, it's a
bit of an odd, odd deal overall.And I would love to have FIFA
plusters to stay disease, but itwas almost inevitable that I
wouldn't. Yeah, Mike said.
I think there's there'll be a lot of stuff we come to learn
later on because there's just, there's not a tonne of details
(17:49):
and sounds like you'll reach outto people and they're telling
you to wait and see. So they're not sharing it
either. So I guess the nice thing is,
Nick, the next story we're goingto talk about, we have much more
concrete details on so we can bea little bit more informed with
some of our opinions on this. And this, I guess is finally
just confirming the whole expression where there's smoke,
there's fire. We've talked about Apple was
(18:10):
going to be a leading contender to land F1 rights in the US and
that has now been confirmed. Five year deal, $750 million
that basically just nearly doubles.
It used to be $85 million a yearwhen they were with ESPN and
their previous deal in the US. So just shy of, you know,
completely doubling that. So I guess few interesting
(18:32):
things, I mean, for me here, Nick, like, hey, they've doubled
it. Congrats to them on that.
I guess sort of, I guess my, my,my initial take on this is it
was alleged that Amazon offered more money than ESPN when that
deal went through. And sort of the argument or
justification that we sort of guessed was whatever money
(18:52):
Amazon was going to be willing to pay over ESPN would have
provided enough value as an editorial business, as a
marketing business to drive awareness.
They would make up for whatever money it lost.
Cause your point? Amazon, similar to to someone
would have had to do some education or bringing people on
board like ESP NS going to give you all that extra stuff.
Is this more of a Formula One isnow just prioritising, let's
(19:16):
just go after the biggest paycheck?
Or do they think after the ESPN deal that there's enough
popularity in a brand awareness in the US that they they can
forfeit some of that editorial coverage that they're just not
going to get with Apple? It's a, it's an interesting
question, isn't it? I was thinking about this coming
in about that conversation we had a few years ago, basically
then and, and, and they're wherewe are now.
(19:38):
I just think the need for editorial coverage from the
media outlets isn't what it usedto be because of the power of
social media. So whether it's F1 producing
their own stuff, whether it's all the influences and other
people creating content or just having all these different touch
points of audiences. Does ESPN covering you in the
news matter as much as it did four or five years ago?
(19:58):
I would, I would suggest it doesn't.
So it's just not quite what it used to be.
Also, when I was living in Jamaica, I would say that I was
watching ESPN quite a bit. We used to get it there.
I think it was by and large the core linear product we were
getting. I didn't really see much chatter
around F1 at all. It wasn't like.
It was a part of the conversation alongside the NCAA
(20:20):
or the NFL or anything like that.
I'd it was very sporadic at best.
And even the broadcast production they were using was
just that largely the UK feed from from Sky.
They weren't putting a lot of effort into it to to make a real
big commitment. Yeah.
So look, I think it's not as important as it used to be, but
there's no question they will lose significant audience off
(20:44):
the back of this deal, significant audience numbers for
F1. There's no question about that,
right? So they have to be comfortable
with by losing that, that the ongoing touch points they were
having with fans is now being they could is, is now going to
drip dip and how they're going to adjust for that.
OK, So maybe ramping up social will be will be one way.
But another thing I think to think about before I go down
(21:06):
that path is why is this productnot worth more?
The IP, the brand is really valuable, but there's really one
important thing to think about in the USF one well in the Usus
is obviously such an advertisingdriven market.
Right. It's all about ad breaks in
every Major League competition and how they monetise that.
(21:29):
We see all the coverage coveringcoming from it.
You and I have talked quite a bit about the growth of
advertising and through streaming as well and how that's
going to prevail globally. Well, the one thing that's
really important to really understand with F1 is where's
the ad breaks coming from? You can't put an ad break in the
middle of a race, so you're going to miss miss all the
action. It's basically it's non-stop for
(21:49):
the whole the whole race. You can do overlays and
different types of smart branding and that's why the
actual in race signage is worth so much because of that always
on side of things. But because it's not really a
good and solid ad product, It isdefinitely a really good
subscription product. F1 is really good for that.
(22:10):
But in this day and age, we've seen the move.
It's all move. It's all been.
It's focused around advertising and a product that maybe drives
subscription, but doesn't move the needle or doesn't allow
supplementary monetization in the same way does limit the
growth potential of F1 as a as ameteorites driver, as a stand
alone product. And that's why actually the fit
(22:31):
with Apple makes a load of sensefor that because they aren't a
bit, they aren't running a big advertising business.
And this is adds another layer to an offering that clearly
needed another premium brand associated with it.
Yeah. And I think, you know, one of
the other interesting things andlike they'll come a little bit
in our conversation before is like there is this whole issue
of like, you know, I think been well, as the PTI describes it as
(22:54):
the squeezed middle, where when you think about how much money
is being invested in the NFL nowin the NBA, there doesn't leave
a tonne of money for other places.
You know, is is, you know, someone that's already investing
billions in the NFL all of the sudden going to put up more cash
for Formula One, which let's be honest, like is maybe the second
or third biggest racing competition in the states.
(23:16):
Like I know over in Europe it's the biggest, but like NASCAR
still really big, IndyCar still really big.
So it's not even the number one motor competition in the US.
And that's before you start filtering in the NFL, the NBA,
Major League Baseball, NHL, all the college sports and the
Premier League is growing over in the US.
So like I think there's the other side of it as well as like
(23:36):
there's probably just not a lot of money left to go around once
everybody split up all their budgets 100.
Percent, I mean, that definitelyplays a role.
However, I would say that if they thought that it was going
to be a massive revenue driver, money would come from somewhere.
It would maybe just give a couple of percentage points off
some of those major college billion dollar deals and that
would instantly, you know, double these numbers.
(23:58):
But yeah, I get I think, I thinkyou're on definitely on to
something there. Look, I love this deal for
Apple. I think it is they needed
something after the MLS deal to add more depth to their sports
product. And let's face it, F1 has been
huge on technology and all the brand sponsorships we've seen.
We've seen Android and Google and other major tech companies,
(24:20):
Oracle and all, all sales force and all I can keep going, all
are linked with F1 in some way, whether it be teams, whether it
be the competition itself in a pretty big way.
So there's obviously a clear dynamic there with that tech
story that really suits a premium brand like Apple.
And I would say F1 is a pretty premium IP business.
(24:42):
So there are some synergies there that they will be able to
leverage for the Apple brand itself.
And we saw that play out obviously with what they did
with the F1 movie deal, which generated several 100 millions
of revenue and actually when it when it's all said and done,
will probably equate to the total value of these meteorites
perhaps by by the end of its full course.
(25:04):
So there's a lot lot to love about it from from Apple's
standpoint. And it's not really a big
investment for them in the grandscheme of things.
It's not a needle mover. So I think it's a no brainer for
them to make this move. But for F1, I do find it's a
little bit of a standstill move.I don't see like I don't see the
upside in this for them. I see it as like, OK, they're
(25:25):
getting a little bit more money out of the meteorites than they
would have otherwise. OK, great.
I don't see how Apple's going toskyrocket a brand invisibility
to to the moon by anything they can do.
They might. I would be surprised if you
don't see an F12 number 2 comingup and they find another way to
bring that to life. And maybe that's linked with all
(25:45):
this, but I just don't think this is going to say a Jack, you
know, basic, what do you call a hockey stick in audience growth
or fandom? Because just because they're
linked and visible on the Apple platform anymore.
Yeah. Well, one thing that they come
through and there was a bit of aquestion mark about if Apple got
involved, what would happen withthe F1 Pro offering the, you
(26:07):
know, all the bells and whistles.
And it does seem like that product is going to stay in
existence embedded within Apple.So I think AI think we're happy
because you know, I'm not the biggest F1 fan in the world, but
I do like it when you have the ability to really, I guess, feed
the hunger of people that reallywant to deep dive into stuff.
So I guess it is nice to see that there were some rumours
(26:28):
what might happen with that platform, because I know in the
Uki don't think you can even getit.
You can only exclusively get Sky.
I don't even think you can subscribe for it.
So it I think that was a question mark.
So to see that it's going to continue to exist is nice, at
least in my opinion. Yeah, the F1 UK product from
what I remember is, is that there is one available, but it's
missing the live, the live racing with all the full bells
(26:49):
and whistles in the US, basically.
I mean, it depends on how you want to position it.
The F1 product will be shut down, I guess, or will be
migrated into the Apple platform, a bit like the NFL
Game Pass approach, I suppose, and indeed with the NBA and
Amazon actually, again, I was talking to them yesterday and
they came up in conversation about that.
(27:09):
So what it's allowing them to dois really create a nice natural
funnel of audience basically forpeople who are accessing just
the Apple TV proposition to easily be able to try and push
them into the more premium product.
And Apple's pretty good at marketing.
So maybe that will be something they can really bring to life
and help F1 basically generate alot more value out of it than
(27:29):
they were before. So I'll be interested if I can
do something special with that in terms of really funnelling a
lot more people to the more premium product.
I heard, I think it was on, I don't know what podcast it was
on. Like it was on unofficial
partners, one that they did recently with at Sportel I was
having listened to the other day.
And that one of the numbers thatwas shared and that was that
that they believe that the valueof the F1 pro TV product is
(27:53):
around 40 million per year. But they weren't really sure
whether that was global or just the US.
Let's assume it's global. It's it's, it's a good chunk of
money. But if it is global, that is
probably only 10% of that will probably come out of the US.
So it's going to be not much of A needle mover there.
So there's a lot of upside potential for all parties if
Apple can help increase that funnel to the premium
(28:16):
proposition. Yeah, well, next door we're
going to move on to Nick, is a comment that was made from the
recent Sportel event. You know.
Go on. Sorry, just before we before we
jump into that, I would say the one other thing just to think
about is, is obviously they've announced this is an exclusive
deal. Well, that means all the rights
will be a house and Apple. I would expect that basically
(28:38):
you'll see similar pro series ofsteps like we did with the MLS
deal. MLS we're eventually some rights
will be sold on to free to air partners, particularly the US
races. Because exactly.
That be our great prime time will be great marketing
visibility for the Apple and forthe F1 as a whole.
And so those those high value races will be then sold on to a
(29:01):
free to air partner to maximise the value of which they have
rated quite well. Well, that's Miami, circular,
the Americas and Vegas. So that's the only thing I'd add
to that is that I wouldn't expect Apple to just sit on this
for five years. I would expect eventually at
some stage they'd be mad not to get some extra visibility
through those other free to air channels.
So expect that to come out over time.
(29:23):
Yeah, definitely. I mean, as you mentioned with
MLS, they did all different kinds of things.
They even did things with our friends that won football.
I mean, I think there was still some stuff on Fox and things
like that. So yeah, I would would expect
that to not exclusively live behind that pay wall.
Yeah. And just I would, you know, for
context, so something for us to think about and which I found
quite surprising to digest is obviously the MLS is what is it
(29:45):
the fifth or sixth biggest league, you know, sixth biggest
league in the US maybe. Yeah, 7th if he comes on, if
you're going to college. As I say, depends on if you're
counting college sports, yeah. I mean like maybe maybe 10th in
terms of scale they would get. They're getting a bigger per
annual, per annual per year check from Apple than F1 is.
Just thought that's an interesting thing.
(30:06):
Just to put in context of the scale of this, it is such a
minor investment for Apple in the grand scheme of things.
Yeah, moving on to the next one.You know, you mentioned Sportel
in Monaco and there's a conversation with LA Legal
president Javier Tabas, who fortunately I think is one of
the most entertaining execs in sports in the sense.
Of Spanish so I can understand him first.
(30:29):
Hand very true, but he's one of the few execs that feels like
probably got some notes from thecomms team and then just looked
at them and said I'm going to I'm going to say what I want to
say sometimes. So it's nice to have that sort
of degree of freshness. But one of the things that came
up is interesting we covered as a story of sports pro was he
made a comment around sort of the difficulty of selling pan
(30:50):
European broadcast deals. And you know, we've kind of
always known that pretty much it's the domestic league is
really popular for the European individual market.
Champions League is really good,but then it is a bit difficult
to to drum up interest from, youknow, other markets for those
domestic rights. And, you know, I don't think
that comments necessarily surprising, but he did say like,
(31:11):
hey, he's open minded to the idea of La Liga potentially
coming across some pan European deal.
And we're seeing more of these the appetite for these global
deals, whether it's a zone with NFL game Pass or, you know,
Amazon with the NBA, you know, these big streamers, although we
just talked about Apple being exclusive to the US, we are
seeing more of these deals wherethey want more of a global
(31:32):
reach. They're not just satisfied with
a single market deal. And just the idea, you know, why
it's so difficult to do in Europe, but what would it maybe
take to start seeing some more pan European deals outside of
your domestic markets? I.
So I think there's a few things,right, Like 1 is someone like La
Liga, I kind of feel like they've missed, they've missed
(31:54):
the peak or they've gone past their peak, let's say.
And the main reason for that is they've just lost so many stars
that I would watch the league because I wanted to see Ronaldo
versus Messi in Barcelona versusReal Madrid.
But I'm, and I used to know every single player on the field
for both teams. Now I couldn't tell you half Now
I'm I'm obviously a sample size of 1 and not yet not their core
(32:14):
audience necessarily. But I do think with losing
Messi, losing Ronaldo, losing Neymar and slowly losing several
players across league, those identities that they did help
build up now puts them in a really tricky proposition of how
they can build audience and build value in new markets that
they could they could offer before.
(32:34):
And I just don't think in particularly this, whether you
call it the squeeze middle or just that rung underneath the
top tier. They just are clearly sitting in
that bucket. I, you know, I've lived in a few
countries, travelled a lot. I never these days, in the last
years, I never hear anyone when I talk about football.
I never mentioned really La Ligathese days.
I'll always mention the Premier League or the local league and
(32:56):
Premier League's does such an incredible job of like
globalising and and holding thattop, that top spot in everyone's
hearts. Like even in Sweden here that
people will normally support twoteams.
Again, it's I think it's a pretty classic model for local
teams that are super passionate about and one of the one of the
Premier League sides and they sit in the great window.
(33:17):
And what also is really big in somewhere like in Sweden is that
the seasons don't clash that much because the in Sweden and
they're the. Big winter break, don't they?
Yeah, well, they basically actually play the sea, they play
the season in the summer, they stop.
So it's actually a completely different season altogether.
So that allows basically to follow a football without a
(33:38):
competing for, with another requisite league.
So anyway, my, my point basically is that I do really
think they are going to struggleto get any longer term
meaningful meteorites revenues and meteorites deals happening
like we've seen with the Bundesliga and the Leaguer in
the UK. They're going to be looking for
like, I don't know, not shortcuts, but things that just
(33:59):
help them access different audience sets.
And the monetization is going tohave to come from advertising
and sponsorship deals and, and, and just focusing on mass
visibility and reach the, the days of meteorites cheques
coming as a, as a second third tier Football League in the
market. I think I just gone.
I, I just can't see where that'sgoing to come now.
Could you see definitely in the zone who's got a relationship
(34:21):
with a Liga in Spain, look to maybe do a, a pan European deal.
I think that could make some sense.
But I don't think we're there yet because I think the Liga
will still in some markets won adecent size, probably more than
their their rights maybe like perhaps what their rights were
worth, maybe not what they wouldbe in the future.
(34:43):
So I think they're in a bit of alimbo zone for the moment and
they're not really sure how they'll get through this.
And then you couple that with that big check they got from
CVC, which was built on meteorites growth as their
measure, because that was the stickiest to measure against.
They are in a really, really tricky position.
Yeah, and Rodger Mitchell, we know, always has great, great
(35:04):
opinions. You know, you got to speak to
him, you know, a couple months back up in your event in Sweden,
you know, he took this post and kind of put his own spin on a
contam. But this is actually maybe a bit
of a warning sign. And again, talking about that
squeezed middle mantra, the sortof the idea that if you can't
find pan European deals, like, you know, that that's actually
problematic. You know, that's that's sort of
(35:25):
emblematic of sort of the state of play of things and almost
like wanting to own moments. Like El Classico's still a big
game, but like no one else's, you know, no one else's
interest. The other ones, you know, went
so far as to say, like, are broadcasters just going to leave
you behind because there's so much media content?
You know, you went further to say, like, does Major League
Baseball have too many games? Like, at what stage do you know,
(35:46):
we talk about Netflix wants to own moments.
Netflix doesn't want the whole season because, you know, we use
baseball, for example, 162 games, most of them, unless
you're the local fan, they don'tcarry that sort of gravitas.
You know, the the Netflix wants the Christmas game.
Amazon wants the Black Friday game.
Like is sports perhaps getting to a point there actually is too
(36:06):
much sports that people really just they don't want all that.
They just want the moments. Well, I mean, the Roger's spot
on. And I think this is this has
been happening in front of our eyes for quite a while now.
But in in the case of Liga, whatwould be the best way to
maximise the value? Again, to your point, like there
is a bunch of teams that I don'teven know what they're called.
I would never be interested in watching a game between those
(36:27):
two. Somehow the Premier League has
done a great job of building up those those second tier 13
teams. So there's still an interest in
following them for some fans. But if you splice and dice the
Liga properly, you basically sell El Classico stand alone to
someone. You would get a huge check, but
the problem is that no one else would get any visibility.
(36:48):
And that and that's why having centralised said rights is great
because it keeps the IT keeps everything balanced.
But is it maximising the value of each and every game they have
available to them? More?
Probably. Probably not.
If they could sell that Classicoalone to Netflix or or one of
the major platforms, they would probably be worth a tidy, tidy
sum and they'd be willing to payfor it because it it is such a
(37:09):
big moment in European football.But all the others would cry
foul because particularly if themoney wasn't getting distributed
equally, but but also because they will be sitting back with
no visibility of their games. Because there's not, not that,
not that global interest in those second and third tier
teams. So a really tricky predicament,
(37:30):
not just for La Liga obviously, but like for, you know,
Bundesliga is facing some challenges with obviously you
have buying being so dominant for so long, it takes away that
competitive edge that makes it appealing to watch more matches.
The French league's obviously been in trouble and we've had
we've seen what sort of moves they've had to make in the UK to
try and get visibility. They can't even get a low tier
(37:50):
broadcast deal with your Sky Sports the world.
I mean that that says that's gotto say something.
Yeah, I think that was part of Richard's comment.
I mean, or, sorry, Roger's comment, he literally said if
I'm a broadcaster and I have oneor the other, or both Premier
League and Champions League, I actually don't have to pay for
anything else. And that it that that itself is
probably a little bit problematic if broadcasters view
(38:12):
it as I just don't even need you.
Yeah. Well, I think we live in this on
demand world as well, right? We're having just being by
building legacy programming models on the fact of just
having something something on isneeded on your linear networks
while in streaming it's just notas important.
People just go to you're just a tile on a screen these days.
They'll just go to something else to watch.
(38:32):
If there's nothing else I reallywant to watch rather than, you
know, like staying on and watching 1/3 tier league match
after a Premier League match. I just don't think it has the
same pool that it used to. Yeah, well, sidebar, I didn't
prep you for this one. Did you follow the story about
the Barcelona game that was supposed to play in Miami that
then got cancelled because of the fans?
(38:53):
I haven't read the story. I saw the headline.
I'm not reading the story. What's the what was the, is it
basically the the the Barsa fansthemselves kicking up a stink?
I think it was legal wide and I think one of the issues that
really kicked it off is the players started protesting.
It's like in the game of something like the players took
a knee for like 15 seconds during the actual game to
protest it. So it wasn't even just like
(39:14):
obviously strong fans, but even the players were.
But again, it goes this idea of La Liga, probably it's an NFL
model, right? Like the NFL wants to grow
globally. So like they're playing in
Mexico, they're playing in Spain, they're playing in
Germany, they're playing in the UK, they're going to go play in
Australia. But La Liga, like they can't
even get one game out of, you know, their 38 game schedule.
I don't know exactly how many they play compared to the
(39:36):
Premier League to go play abroadjust in an effort, in an attempt
to try and, you know, build somerevenue.
And I get it, right. Like I understand what fans are,
but it just it goes this whole thing like they can't, I don't
want to say get out of their ownway because like obviously you
have to respect the fans and theplayers, but at the same time,
like it's hard to grow if like you can't even do that.
(39:59):
Well, it's a challenge for a fewreasons, but also I think it's
important to note that in Latin America La Liga is still quite
strong as, as that second tier thing like in that market, the
IT probably usurps Premier League in a lot of markets.
I'm not sure every which ones they they do and don't.
And so obviously there's a huge Latin American influence in
Miami and across across the US. Really, you've got to remember
(40:21):
the Liga is a very, very nice looking deal with ESPN that is
worth I think like a billion or two.
I'd be frightened about what that's worth in the next renewal
period. Because if they can't get games
happening there to build more fandom and interest and prove to
ESPN and other broadcaster in the US that hey, we have an
(40:42):
audience here that wants to watch us play more, that again
is going to make it really difficult for them to get that
renewal done to the level that they need.
It's, I mean, building that balance between fans that you
were talking about is the biggest challenge footballers
facing now because they have board, you call themselves like
falling in bed with investment and taking extra equity and cash
(41:02):
and all this stuff into it, putting huge pressure on the
finances. They have to, they require
they're mandated by their ownership groups and everyone to
draw grow more revenue, revenue,revenue across the league.
This this is what happens as a result of that.
You start what you've got like, I don't know, there's some sort
of metaphor I could probably come up with like ringing
something too long before all the waters dried up.
(41:25):
I think this is kind of inevitable state of it.
And a lot of them, I use the example all the time, like the
Man United example with fans where they got so sick of the
existing ownership because they were rid layering the club with
debt and, you know, basically doing it for their own own
devices to basically secure, youknow, income themselves.
That was the that was the narrative.
(41:46):
And that's not going to go down with fans.
And this kind of has the same feeling of it.
The fans just don't like to be taken for a ride ultimately.
Yeah, well, again, another short.
Nick, I don't know if you saw it.
Did you see Real Madrid is trying to sue FIFA or sorry, not
FIFA, UEFA for $4 billion? Just 4 billion.
I did see that I hadn't read that article, but I mean, it
(42:08):
shows how messy the state of football is.
And just a final point back to going full circle back to this
La Liga challenge is that is whythis whole European Super League
thing came out. Like if, if they want to knock
Premier League off the perch, let's face it, Premier League is
#1 by a long, long, long way nowin terms of interest, even
(42:29):
across Europe. The only way they're going to
knock them off their perch is for something completely
out-of-the-box. But there's no way that it's
going to work because of all thefinancial I got a dependencies
on the current current model. So that's why the European Super
League popped up and to the top.We can have more pain and more
(42:49):
blood spilled before we get anywhere reasonable.
Let's just make a Brexit joke, Nick, because we can, we can
just, you can sell the European Super League and you just don't
include the English teams, right?
Well, that's what I'm actually thinking they should seriously
do though. I seriously think they should
double down on that and and justignore and like try and be a
rival with it. I think that would actually get
some serious viewership, but. Here you go.
(43:13):
Yeah, It could become a Ryder Cup style where you have the
English teams, then play those those European teams in the
European Super League and like, here we go, Nick, someone hire
us. They're.
Just going to get a few billion from somewhere to get started to
pay all these. Extra fees, but you know, we'll
just call someone else I'm. Still got a few investors
listening to this. Yeah, I'm sure we'll get some
investors listening to this guy.Genius.
(43:34):
Guys, I'm on. I'm on the case.
Give me, give me a few weeks. Can't wait.
Well, everyone, I do appreciate you tuning in for another
episode of Stream TIME Sports. It's been a pleasure, Nick.
For those that don't know, this won't be the last time you hear
my voice this year. The magic of Hollywood.
But I'm going on paternity for the next two months.
So this is the last episode, Nick, you and I are going to do
for a while. But we still have plenty of
content. You and I have already built up
(43:55):
a Bank of stuff. We'll have content from the
Media Summit in Madrid as well. But yeah, this is this is my
last time. Signing off for a little bit,
Nick. It it is indeed.
Now I do think we might have, dowe have maybe not episode that
pops up with yeah, your voice will pop up on a few episodes
randomly over the next. Couple of months.
Yeah, yeah, but, and I will be doing a few solo.
Well, not solo, actually. We'll be listening to monologues
(44:16):
of Mick Meacham for for an hour.That would be, that'd be
frightening. And I'd be worried for you all
if I decided to do that something.
I'll do that sort of initiative.But yeah, look, it's I've always
enjoyed doing this with you, Chris.
I'm looking forward to picking up the mic again with you soon
once you get to the next couple of months.
But all the best for that periodof time and I look forward to
(44:38):
hearing how it's all gone and hopefully you've got some sleep
through it all. And yeah, we'll talk.
We'll talk afterwards. Absolutely.
I'll try my best. But yeah, one of those episodes,
Nick, is our 200th episodes, so.That's right, you'll.
Get you'll get to hear lots of feedback.
You know, we won't go into in this one.
Enjoy that one. But yes, there'll be lots of
looking back on some of the stuff that we have done Nick.
And then, you know, 2026, we've already got plans for noon.
Big things, right? We do, we are going to change
(45:00):
things up and add some extra layers and dimensions to the
show. So stay tuned for that.
I have to just say that the, the200 episode we have, we have
recorded, we have lost track of how many episodes we've done
because we can't find a single source of truth.
So we're not sure if we actuallyrecorded the 200th ages ago, but
ignore that and just think of when you do hear the 200th
(45:21):
episode drop, that that is the that is the that is definitely
possibly maybe the 200th episode.
Yeah, we've recorded. But a little look and reflection
on where we are as an industry and what we've seen over the
last couple of years. So it should be.
It's a fun listen. Awesome.
Thank you everybody. Thanks everyone.
Hello everyone, welcome back to the next episode of Stream Time
Sports. My name is Chris Stone, the
community lead, joined as alwaysby our CEO Nick Meacham.
Now, Nick, as a recording this Isaw a statistic which actually
feels a bit crazy to not that it's, you know, this is the
case, but apparently the San Antonio Spurs for the first time
in franchise history have started 5 and O given the
success that that franchise has had, it seems a bit crazy to
(00:26):
think they've not started a season 5 and O.
But kind of the reason I'm reaching is that have you
watched any of the highlights ofWembe this year so far?
I have seen a few of the the highlights and it is like one of
those things you've seen at highschool where like the year, I
don't know, the year 12 kid, the17 year old kid starts to play
pick up ball with the 13 year olds and just bullies them.
Like it's unbelievable. It is truly, I mean, it's always
(00:50):
been this build up for the last couple of years about how good
he is. But to see that now, whatever he
did, that that, that that was it.
Shaolin Monk Temple. Yeah, it's clearly paid off
because he's he's up to the nextlevel, that's for sure.
It's just like when in a video game you can build a player and
like, you just build a player. That's just unrealistic.
Like it's literally what it is. Like he's dunking without
(01:11):
leaving the ground. It's just like you shouldn't be
able to do all these things at that size.
Yeah, I remember playing some video games and when I was
younger and when that custom player building thing became a
thing and having a lot of fun with that.
Where you'd build in in the NFL Madden game, I built like a 7
foot 6 running back just becauseit looks stupid and it was a bit
funny and tried it with a bunch of other different sports as
(01:34):
well. Like, yeah, but you can change
obviously players like Messi to from his little 5 foot, I know 5
foot 7 to to being 7 foot behemoth if you can customise
the settings. But it is a whole different
world. I was actually talking to the
NBA yesterday on the prep call for our media summit session
that we're running next month, and they were just waxing
(01:58):
lyrical about how impactful, notonly how amazing he is, but how
impactful it is just to the fandom around the NBA globally.
It is really got everyone payingattention and to the incredible
story, you know, like from from day one.
And even when you heard him talking before we got drafted,
you just knew he wasn't going tofail.
Like the only thing that could fail him is his body breaking
(02:21):
down basically, I think. And he's he's proven that he can
take another gear from where he was last year.
Yeah, and it's important thing for the NBA.
You know, we talked about it all, all the time.
Celebrity driven, you know, athletes and things like that.
I think there probably is that question.
You know, Lebron's maybe got a year or two left and, you know,
Katie's never quite reached thatlevel of LeBron to start him.
Like Steph Curry's only got a couple more years left.
(02:42):
Like there's always that question of like, who's going to
take it over? You know, Patrick Mahomes took
the throne from Tom Brady a little bit and you know, who was
going to be that next person, you know, once LeBron stepped
away. So, yeah, it just, it it seems
very well prepared and like having to be international, I'm
sure helps like, and as you say,like, he's incredibly well
spoken. Like yeah.
(03:03):
I mean, I it, it seems a pretty fortunate thing for the NBA to
be saying goodbye to LeBron and,you know, Steph Curry and Katie
and some of those guys and sort of welcoming in a new era of
Wendy. Yeah.
I'm amazed at how. Personal or how much of I guess
just he, he, when he, when I first heard him speak a couple
of years ago, obviously he's, he's come from France, typically
(03:24):
French and their English is a little bit not quite as advanced
as perhaps others in terms of being able to speak it
eloquently and become a, a face and a brand.
But within a few months, I couldsee that he put so much effort
in and you heard that thick American twang coming through
his his interviews and he's really grown as this personality
alongside that. So and he's got a real, what do
(03:46):
you call it, like a clean image,which I think the league would
love. They don't want.
It's nice to have a couple of like bad boys in your Iverson's
and those types of players that have come through.
But he just gives them somethingthat they can hang their hats
on. Again, fingers crossed that he
holds his body holds up for the for the next decade or so,
because that is, I really think,the only thing that's going to
(04:06):
stop someone like him. Yeah, that's just you're not
going to see anybody defend him,but moving on.
I would say just quickly for anyone who isn't a fan of the
NBA but isn't a fan of basketball, just go and check it
out because it is a different, it is a different thing.
It's one of those things that I don't know, you can think of
other sports where like Tiger Woods brought, you know, brought
(04:27):
fans to golf because he was doing something that no one else
could do. I almost think if he can
continue this, that that sort oflevel of he's playing a
different game. He's changing the way the sport
is played. I mean, if you don't like
basketball, go check it out because it is something else.
Absolutely. He's generally that freaky.
But moving on to business stuff,Nick, we're going to start off.
There's a few new juicy stories.They they include, you know,
(04:47):
talking about some of the streaming platforms that we've
all been talking about and following.
So we'll kind of jump just straight into a little bit,
Nick. We're going to talk about FIFA
and the Zone. We talked about kind of what a
big accomplishment it was for FIFA to launch the FIFA plus
platform at the time that they did.
We talked about how, you know, we appreciated it, the idea of
(05:09):
it being sort of an ad supportive model, free access.
We knew that it wasn't going to have like the big major games,
but it was a good way to democratise content around the
globe and just the scale of it. I mean, what they do something
like 40,000 games or something like that and they're.
Something like. That it was a really, you know,
incredible number given what it was.
We also know that FIFA's got therelationship with the zone from
(05:30):
the Club World Cup. There's also talking about the
the money funding from Saudi Arabia, which is, you know,
being invested into the zone. But there's also, you know, the
World Cup being hosted in Saudi Arabia.
I think. What is that in 2034, 2020, 34?
Yeah, it's somewhere along thoselines.
(05:51):
Largely it is 2034, Nick, because US is 2026.
The 2031 is the one that's goingto be hosted in like 3 different
continents as an excuse to then go back to Saudi Arabia in 2034.
So there, there's all those tiesin there as well.
But it's now been announced thatThe Zone is going to continue to
add another streaming platform onto its existing platform.
(06:13):
You know, NFL Game Pass, NHL, they've been doing this approach
of basically onboarding other people's platforms into their
own and FIFA Plus will now be the next platform to be hosted
on the Zone network. I suppose we can call it now.
Yeah, it's. It's an interesting journey to
get to this point and a fascinating deal to see come to
life. We I heard, I think this first
(06:35):
got preliminarily announced justafter the Club World Cup, right?
And when I heard the announcement, the first thing I
did, I reached out to both sidesand said, well, does this mean
that the actual stand alone product will cease to exist?
And I did it again this time around.
And both of them are saying you'll have to wait and see
basically, which I find really just bizarre.
(06:57):
Are they what, what's the concern about just making it
clear what's going to happen. One thing some things I heard
through the industry was basically a deal was agreed very
swiftly between both parties andnow they're still trying to work
out what happens and that that whether that's true or not, I
don't know. Other speculation that I will
(07:18):
speculate on is, is this a extension of the Club World Cup
deal was already pre agreed, which goes against the other
other point. But let's just say that that's a
question. Is this a like a supplementary
thing that's been added in because maybe the Club World Cup
didn't deliver the value or relative to the revenue that to
(07:41):
zone expected from It is an interesting thing to consider.
Is this a step for zone to get get further embedded with FIFA?
So when the World Cups come along, the next one, subsequent
ones, they're going to be a better chance of basically
actually getting some of those premium World Cup rights.
(08:01):
Lots of questions about the whole deal in itself and I am
taking a step back. The FIFA Plus product in the
proposition, what I loved about when it launched, yes, it was
free to access, but it was also democratising and giving access
to all those under resourced, underdeveloped countries and
federations as part of FIFA to be able to get their games
(08:21):
broadcast and streamed and available to fans in their
markets but also globally. People don't underestimate how
big that was for I think some ofthe the lower tier countries to
have that capability. But the challenge has always
been about this monetization challenge.
If they had launched this without this massive price tag
hanging over it's head, whether it's this billion dollar number
(08:43):
that that Infantino suggested that it's that we're going to
get investment for a few years back or and it was just going to
be an extension and an initiative and sorry.
And I would say add to that, that what I was hearing was that
there was a lot of reassurance, I won't say promises, there are
reassurance that FIFA was going to use this as a revenue driver,
(09:06):
that that money was going to getthen distributed to all the
member associations. And if none of those things are
really happening to the level they expected, that's probably
where this has been. There's been not much choice
other than let's cut all the costs away from running this
platform, hand it over to Zone, who's an expert at these sorts
(09:28):
of things. We'll be able to basically keep
keep the lights on and keep thisplatform alive in some capacity
and some variation of it, what it would have meant to be.
And they're happy because they've got now the FIFA brand
associated with the Zone, givingthem more of a global audience.
Although again, like you said atthe start, the media rights
(09:49):
they've acquired is gonna be marginal.
It's it was actually a really small part of the entire release
was oh, and you'll get live matches available.
Yeah. The rest was all about all the
other editorial and non live content you'll get.
So it's going to be a hub. It's going to be focused around
content. Live will be one part of it, but
it won't be the they won't be like the the new destination for
(10:11):
everyone to go to consume fever stuff in there the same way it
could be if they started to put some more premium stuff in
there. So I'm not sure how I feel about
it all really. Yeah, it's kind of like if you
put two pies together, the the amount of games that were on
FIFA Plus is actually the majority of the pie.
But the games that are actually worth something are actually the
very small minority of the pie. So that's where it's I guess a
(10:33):
little bit, I don't want to say misleading, but like it just
needs to be understood. Like, yes, that 40,000 number is
really impressive, but actually that 40,000 number probably
really actually isn't worth evenmaybe 1% of 1% of like what the
World Cup is going to be worth. So it's sort of like there's
that dichotomy between what's actually being offered versus
what's actually people broadcastshould be willing to pay for.
(10:55):
100% and you know, they again, to emphasise the point, but this
was a real valuable proposition for those developing countries
who didn't have their capabilities to monetize and to
distribute the content. So basically the onus was on say
some of these countries, let's say I don't know an African
(11:16):
country, like I don't know, I'm going to say Senegal, just
random. I'm not sure how it advanced
their ecosystem and infrastructure is, but allow
them to have all they have to dois get the feed into FIFA's
ecosystem and they'll do the rest.
They'll get a broadcast line. They'll make the games
accessible for open to watch andthey can add that advertising
layer revenue, revenue generation to create some sort
(11:40):
of income for them, even if it is marginal.
But just having the games visible for people across the
world. It also was allowing those
lesser countries to have their teams and and potential talent
available because you know how much transfers are worth, right?
And scouting's worth in that sort of thing, like imagine if
more of that was being democratised and more junior
(12:01):
stars from in, in countries and regions like Africa and Asia
were being easily accessible to other pro clubs and teams as
well. That was another way that they
could generate income. Just think if they sell one
player at a decent level, that'sit.
That could be game changer for some of these lower tier clubs
and, and nations. So or I'm not sure what the
future of that holds. Like is that going to be
something that's still going to be available or I the kind of
(12:24):
sense and fear that that might be put to the side because it's
not a kneel mover for the zone and they need to worry about
their own best interests would be my my guess.
But who knows what that that ultimate degree agreement and
what the end result will be. I'm not sure.
I'm sure they know. Yeah.
Well, that that's the interesting thing, right, is I
think the 1 billion is kind of what was reported as you know,
someone taking a equity stake inFIFA plus the zone is obviously
(12:47):
not paying a billion dollars forthis.
But to your point, they are going to take over the hardware
side of things in terms of the development, which isn't
nothing. But I don't again, I think it
just sort of clouds or muddies the water a little bit as to
what this transaction actually is because like you said, I've,
I couldn't tell you how much it cost to build a streaming
(13:09):
platform, but I assume it's lessthan a billion.
So like, I just sort of, I don'tknow, muddy's the waters a
little bit, I guess between likeit's clear what the zone is
offering. I just, I don't, yeah, I'm, I'm
scratching my eye a little bit too, Nick.
Yeah. But look, I think first, we know
it doesn't cost a lot to build aplatform on this.
But with the complexity of reaching all the different
nations and providing them services are what I understood.
(13:32):
It is basically a monetization driver for them, whether it's
enabling them to just have theircontent more available or just
to to create organic advertisingrevenue coming off this
platform. And it has not worked to
whatever the expectation I thinkhas said, at least from what I
can see from outside in. So look, yeah, if the designer
(13:53):
adds another layer to it, I haveno idea whether the designer
have had to pay a load for this.I'd be shocked if I had, unless
it's linked with some again, a bit like the Club World Cup deal
of links with, you know, one of the things that the Zone has
done quite successfully is extract a lot of value and and
support financially from obviously through surge from
(14:14):
Saudi Arabia, Riyadh Season became their premier, I don't
know, sponsor all the zone content.
If you remember that announcement a while ago and
Matchroom were in partnership with the zone running events out
of there and running their pay-per-view stuff from there
originally. And they're heavily linked with
the boxing side of things. So again, is this like just
(14:35):
basically another way for that, let's say for further revenue to
be out of be generated through the zone rather than having to
come through basically through means through Saudi means
directly through FIFA channels, which is a little bit more
complex and complicated. Again, I'm not sure what the
outcomes are, but that definitely opens up the door for
that types of those types of deals and monetization to be
(14:57):
made a little bit easier becausejust don't have to work.
Don't worry about all the complexities that come with
being in International Federation.
So we'll have to wait and see. The the other question I would
ask flipping it on the other side, is this this even in the
best interest of FIFA? And the way I'm going to phrase
this is we, the way we've sort of talked about FIFA plus it's
about accessibility. It's about it's a reach play
(15:19):
because it's there's no subscriptions.
It's simply about how many eyeballs can we get to try to
drive as much advertising? Is it only even the best place
for this? Like, would you argue and maybe
this goes to the point is a really quick deal?
You know, I don't know all the tech perspective, but like
obviously YouTube TV is launchedand the NFL Sunday tickets, so
they do have stuff like this on.Granted, it wouldn't be a
(15:39):
subscription like that, but if the goal is to get as many
eyeballs on as possible to zone possibly even the best option of
places for FIFA to try to put this platform.
Well, I mean, it all depends on where you draw the line and what
sort of content we're talking about, because obviously YouTube
and YouTube TV is pure video andwe'll definitely get bigger
audiences, but their emphasis was on all the other content
(16:02):
that comes with it. So the non live stuff there is
the editorial aspects of it. Maybe some of the fifa.com
coverage that they have around some of the other leagues might
be filtered into that as well. So it is they are trying to
build a hub. And like I said before, the live
part doesn't feel like it's as big a like a flagship component
(16:23):
of this deal as you might think it might be.
But it's not presented as such, at least from what I how I
digested some of that. So is it the best place for it?
I don't think I could think if they wanted to have this hub
concept, if if say FIFA suggested they wanted that, I
can't think of anyone else who would be a better partner for
them globally to do that type ofthing.
(16:44):
I'm not sure about the zones breadth on the editorial front
to like tell those stories and whether they would just be
funnelling FIFA content or doingit all themselves.
But I have seen them actually, Ithink hiring people in the
editorial roles and they're basically promoting some roles
in that team. So maybe that's all linked with
the same same initiative. But look, I think the zone
(17:08):
basically in the in the end, they get another little layer to
add to the mix. How needle moving is that for
everyone? I think they've got the also the
major challenge of educating everyone again in new markets is
the zone. Like the zone is not going to be
known in a lot of those again developing countries because
club or cup was only really relevant to those clubs that
(17:28):
were involved. So they still a lot of work to
do for visibility and awareness.So yeah, it's a bit of a, it's a
bit of an odd, odd deal overall.And I would love to have FIFA
plusters to stay disease, but itwas almost inevitable that I
wouldn't. Yeah, Mike said.
I think there's there'll be a lot of stuff we come to learn
later on because there's just, there's not a tonne of details
(17:49):
and sounds like you'll reach outto people and they're telling
you to wait and see. So they're not sharing it
either. So I guess the nice thing is,
Nick, the next story we're goingto talk about, we have much more
concrete details on so we can bea little bit more informed with
some of our opinions on this. And this, I guess is finally
just confirming the whole expression where there's smoke,
there's fire. We've talked about Apple was
(18:10):
going to be a leading contender to land F1 rights in the US and
that has now been confirmed. Five year deal, $750 million
that basically just nearly doubles.
It used to be $85 million a yearwhen they were with ESPN and
their previous deal in the US. So just shy of, you know,
completely doubling that. So I guess few interesting
(18:32):
things, I mean, for me here, Nick, like, hey, they've doubled
it. Congrats to them on that.
I guess sort of, I guess my, my,my initial take on this is it
was alleged that Amazon offered more money than ESPN when that
deal went through. And sort of the argument or
justification that we sort of guessed was whatever money
(18:52):
Amazon was going to be willing to pay over ESPN would have
provided enough value as an editorial business, as a
marketing business to drive awareness.
They would make up for whatever money it lost.
Cause your point? Amazon, similar to to someone
would have had to do some education or bringing people on
board like ESP NS going to give you all that extra stuff.
Is this more of a Formula One isnow just prioritising, let's
(19:16):
just go after the biggest paycheck?
Or do they think after the ESPN deal that there's enough
popularity in a brand awareness in the US that they they can
forfeit some of that editorial coverage that they're just not
going to get with Apple? It's a, it's an interesting
question, isn't it? I was thinking about this coming
in about that conversation we had a few years ago, basically
then and, and, and they're wherewe are now.
(19:38):
I just think the need for editorial coverage from the
media outlets isn't what it usedto be because of the power of
social media. So whether it's F1 producing
their own stuff, whether it's all the influences and other
people creating content or just having all these different touch
points of audiences. Does ESPN covering you in the
news matter as much as it did four or five years ago?
(19:58):
I would, I would suggest it doesn't.
So it's just not quite what it used to be.
Also, when I was living in Jamaica, I would say that I was
watching ESPN quite a bit. We used to get it there.
I think it was by and large the core linear product we were
getting. I didn't really see much chatter
around F1 at all. It wasn't like.
It was a part of the conversation alongside the NCAA
(20:20):
or the NFL or anything like that.
I'd it was very sporadic at best.
And even the broadcast production they were using was
just that largely the UK feed from from Sky.
They weren't putting a lot of effort into it to to make a real
big commitment. Yeah.
So look, I think it's not as important as it used to be, but
there's no question they will lose significant audience off
(20:44):
the back of this deal, significant audience numbers for
F1. There's no question about that,
right? So they have to be comfortable
with by losing that, that the ongoing touch points they were
having with fans is now being they could is, is now going to
drip dip and how they're going to adjust for that.
OK, So maybe ramping up social will be will be one way.
But another thing I think to think about before I go down
(21:06):
that path is why is this productnot worth more?
The IP, the brand is really valuable, but there's really one
important thing to think about in the USF one well in the Usus
is obviously such an advertisingdriven market.
Right. It's all about ad breaks in
every Major League competition and how they monetise that.
(21:29):
We see all the coverage coveringcoming from it.
You and I have talked quite a bit about the growth of
advertising and through streaming as well and how that's
going to prevail globally. Well, the one thing that's
really important to really understand with F1 is where's
the ad breaks coming from? You can't put an ad break in the
middle of a race, so you're going to miss miss all the
action. It's basically it's non-stop for
(21:49):
the whole the whole race. You can do overlays and
different types of smart branding and that's why the
actual in race signage is worth so much because of that always
on side of things. But because it's not really a
good and solid ad product, It isdefinitely a really good
subscription product. F1 is really good for that.
(22:10):
But in this day and age, we've seen the move.
It's all move. It's all been.
It's focused around advertising and a product that maybe drives
subscription, but doesn't move the needle or doesn't allow
supplementary monetization in the same way does limit the
growth potential of F1 as a as ameteorites driver, as a stand
alone product. And that's why actually the fit
(22:31):
with Apple makes a load of sensefor that because they aren't a
bit, they aren't running a big advertising business.
And this is adds another layer to an offering that clearly
needed another premium brand associated with it.
Yeah. And I think, you know, one of
the other interesting things andlike they'll come a little bit
in our conversation before is like there is this whole issue
of like, you know, I think been well, as the PTI describes it as
(22:54):
the squeezed middle, where when you think about how much money
is being invested in the NFL nowin the NBA, there doesn't leave
a tonne of money for other places.
You know, is is, you know, someone that's already investing
billions in the NFL all of the sudden going to put up more cash
for Formula One, which let's be honest, like is maybe the second
or third biggest racing competition in the states.
(23:16):
Like I know over in Europe it's the biggest, but like NASCAR
still really big, IndyCar still really big.
So it's not even the number one motor competition in the US.
And that's before you start filtering in the NFL, the NBA,
Major League Baseball, NHL, all the college sports and the
Premier League is growing over in the US.
So like I think there's the other side of it as well as like
(23:36):
there's probably just not a lot of money left to go around once
everybody split up all their budgets 100.
Percent, I mean, that definitelyplays a role.
However, I would say that if they thought that it was going
to be a massive revenue driver, money would come from somewhere.
It would maybe just give a couple of percentage points off
some of those major college billion dollar deals and that
would instantly, you know, double these numbers.
(23:58):
But yeah, I get I think, I thinkyou're on definitely on to
something there. Look, I love this deal for
Apple. I think it is they needed
something after the MLS deal to add more depth to their sports
product. And let's face it, F1 has been
huge on technology and all the brand sponsorships we've seen.
We've seen Android and Google and other major tech companies,
(24:20):
Oracle and all, all sales force and all I can keep going, all
are linked with F1 in some way, whether it be teams, whether it
be the competition itself in a pretty big way.
So there's obviously a clear dynamic there with that tech
story that really suits a premium brand like Apple.
And I would say F1 is a pretty premium IP business.
(24:42):
So there are some synergies there that they will be able to
leverage for the Apple brand itself.
And we saw that play out obviously with what they did
with the F1 movie deal, which generated several 100 millions
of revenue and actually when it when it's all said and done,
will probably equate to the total value of these meteorites
perhaps by by the end of its full course.
(25:04):
So there's a lot lot to love about it from from Apple's
standpoint. And it's not really a big
investment for them in the grandscheme of things.
It's not a needle mover. So I think it's a no brainer for
them to make this move. But for F1, I do find it's a
little bit of a standstill move.I don't see like I don't see the
upside in this for them. I see it as like, OK, they're
(25:25):
getting a little bit more money out of the meteorites than they
would have otherwise. OK, great.
I don't see how Apple's going toskyrocket a brand invisibility
to to the moon by anything they can do.
They might. I would be surprised if you
don't see an F12 number 2 comingup and they find another way to
bring that to life. And maybe that's linked with all
(25:45):
this, but I just don't think this is going to say a Jack, you
know, basic, what do you call a hockey stick in audience growth
or fandom? Because just because they're
linked and visible on the Apple platform anymore.
Yeah. Well, one thing that they come
through and there was a bit of aquestion mark about if Apple got
involved, what would happen withthe F1 Pro offering the, you
(26:07):
know, all the bells and whistles.
And it does seem like that product is going to stay in
existence embedded within Apple.So I think AI think we're happy
because you know, I'm not the biggest F1 fan in the world, but
I do like it when you have the ability to really, I guess, feed
the hunger of people that reallywant to deep dive into stuff.
So I guess it is nice to see that there were some rumours
(26:28):
what might happen with that platform, because I know in the
Uki don't think you can even getit.
You can only exclusively get Sky.
I don't even think you can subscribe for it.
So it I think that was a question mark.
So to see that it's going to continue to exist is nice, at
least in my opinion. Yeah, the F1 UK product from
what I remember is, is that there is one available, but it's
missing the live, the live racing with all the full bells
(26:49):
and whistles in the US, basically.
I mean, it depends on how you want to position it.
The F1 product will be shut down, I guess, or will be
migrated into the Apple platform, a bit like the NFL
Game Pass approach, I suppose, and indeed with the NBA and
Amazon actually, again, I was talking to them yesterday and
they came up in conversation about that.
(27:09):
So what it's allowing them to dois really create a nice natural
funnel of audience basically forpeople who are accessing just
the Apple TV proposition to easily be able to try and push
them into the more premium product.
And Apple's pretty good at marketing.
So maybe that will be something they can really bring to life
and help F1 basically generate alot more value out of it than
(27:29):
they were before. So I'll be interested if I can
do something special with that in terms of really funnelling a
lot more people to the more premium product.
I heard, I think it was on, I don't know what podcast it was
on. Like it was on unofficial
partners, one that they did recently with at Sportel I was
having listened to the other day.
And that one of the numbers thatwas shared and that was that
that they believe that the valueof the F1 pro TV product is
(27:53):
around 40 million per year. But they weren't really sure
whether that was global or just the US.
Let's assume it's global. It's it's, it's a good chunk of
money. But if it is global, that is
probably only 10% of that will probably come out of the US.
So it's going to be not much of A needle mover there.
So there's a lot of upside potential for all parties if
Apple can help increase that funnel to the premium
(28:16):
proposition. Yeah, well, next door we're
going to move on to Nick, is a comment that was made from the
recent Sportel event. You know.
Go on. Sorry, just before we before we
jump into that, I would say the one other thing just to think
about is, is obviously they've announced this is an exclusive
deal. Well, that means all the rights
will be a house and Apple. I would expect that basically
(28:38):
you'll see similar pro series ofsteps like we did with the MLS
deal. MLS we're eventually some rights
will be sold on to free to air partners, particularly the US
races. Because exactly.
That be our great prime time will be great marketing
visibility for the Apple and forthe F1 as a whole.
And so those those high value races will be then sold on to a
(29:01):
free to air partner to maximise the value of which they have
rated quite well. Well, that's Miami, circular,
the Americas and Vegas. So that's the only thing I'd add
to that is that I wouldn't expect Apple to just sit on this
for five years. I would expect eventually at
some stage they'd be mad not to get some extra visibility
through those other free to air channels.
So expect that to come out over time.
(29:23):
Yeah, definitely. I mean, as you mentioned with
MLS, they did all different kinds of things.
They even did things with our friends that won football.
I mean, I think there was still some stuff on Fox and things
like that. So yeah, I would would expect
that to not exclusively live behind that pay wall.
Yeah. And just I would, you know, for
context, so something for us to think about and which I found
quite surprising to digest is obviously the MLS is what is it
(29:45):
the fifth or sixth biggest league, you know, sixth biggest
league in the US maybe. Yeah, 7th if he comes on, if
you're going to college. As I say, depends on if you're
counting college sports, yeah. I mean like maybe maybe 10th in
terms of scale they would get. They're getting a bigger per
annual, per annual per year check from Apple than F1 is.
Just thought that's an interesting thing.
(30:06):
Just to put in context of the scale of this, it is such a
minor investment for Apple in the grand scheme of things.
Yeah, moving on to the next one.You know, you mentioned Sportel
in Monaco and there's a conversation with LA Legal
president Javier Tabas, who fortunately I think is one of
the most entertaining execs in sports in the sense.
Of Spanish so I can understand him first.
(30:29):
Hand very true, but he's one of the few execs that feels like
probably got some notes from thecomms team and then just looked
at them and said I'm going to I'm going to say what I want to
say sometimes. So it's nice to have that sort
of degree of freshness. But one of the things that came
up is interesting we covered as a story of sports pro was he
made a comment around sort of the difficulty of selling pan
(30:50):
European broadcast deals. And you know, we've kind of
always known that pretty much it's the domestic league is
really popular for the European individual market.
Champions League is really good,but then it is a bit difficult
to to drum up interest from, youknow, other markets for those
domestic rights. And, you know, I don't think
that comments necessarily surprising, but he did say like,
(31:11):
hey, he's open minded to the idea of La Liga potentially
coming across some pan European deal.
And we're seeing more of these the appetite for these global
deals, whether it's a zone with NFL game Pass or, you know,
Amazon with the NBA, you know, these big streamers, although we
just talked about Apple being exclusive to the US, we are
seeing more of these deals wherethey want more of a global
(31:32):
reach. They're not just satisfied with
a single market deal. And just the idea, you know, why
it's so difficult to do in Europe, but what would it maybe
take to start seeing some more pan European deals outside of
your domestic markets? I.
So I think there's a few things,right, Like 1 is someone like La
Liga, I kind of feel like they've missed, they've missed
(31:54):
the peak or they've gone past their peak, let's say.
And the main reason for that is they've just lost so many stars
that I would watch the league because I wanted to see Ronaldo
versus Messi in Barcelona versusReal Madrid.
But I'm, and I used to know every single player on the field
for both teams. Now I couldn't tell you half Now
I'm I'm obviously a sample size of 1 and not yet not their core
(32:14):
audience necessarily. But I do think with losing
Messi, losing Ronaldo, losing Neymar and slowly losing several
players across league, those identities that they did help
build up now puts them in a really tricky proposition of how
they can build audience and build value in new markets that
they could they could offer before.
(32:34):
And I just don't think in particularly this, whether you
call it the squeeze middle or just that rung underneath the
top tier. They just are clearly sitting in
that bucket. I, you know, I've lived in a few
countries, travelled a lot. I never these days, in the last
years, I never hear anyone when I talk about football.
I never mentioned really La Ligathese days.
I'll always mention the Premier League or the local league and
(32:56):
Premier League's does such an incredible job of like
globalising and and holding thattop, that top spot in everyone's
hearts. Like even in Sweden here that
people will normally support twoteams.
Again, it's I think it's a pretty classic model for local
teams that are super passionate about and one of the one of the
Premier League sides and they sit in the great window.
(33:17):
And what also is really big in somewhere like in Sweden is that
the seasons don't clash that much because the in Sweden and
they're the. Big winter break, don't they?
Yeah, well, they basically actually play the sea, they play
the season in the summer, they stop.
So it's actually a completely different season altogether.
So that allows basically to follow a football without a
(33:38):
competing for, with another requisite league.
So anyway, my, my point basically is that I do really
think they are going to struggleto get any longer term
meaningful meteorites revenues and meteorites deals happening
like we've seen with the Bundesliga and the Leaguer in
the UK. They're going to be looking for
like, I don't know, not shortcuts, but things that just
(33:59):
help them access different audience sets.
And the monetization is going tohave to come from advertising
and sponsorship deals and, and, and just focusing on mass
visibility and reach the, the days of meteorites cheques
coming as a, as a second third tier Football League in the
market. I think I just gone.
I, I just can't see where that'sgoing to come now.
Could you see definitely in the zone who's got a relationship
(34:21):
with a Liga in Spain, look to maybe do a, a pan European deal.
I think that could make some sense.
But I don't think we're there yet because I think the Liga
will still in some markets won adecent size, probably more than
their their rights maybe like perhaps what their rights were
worth, maybe not what they wouldbe in the future.
(34:43):
So I think they're in a bit of alimbo zone for the moment and
they're not really sure how they'll get through this.
And then you couple that with that big check they got from
CVC, which was built on meteorites growth as their
measure, because that was the stickiest to measure against.
They are in a really, really tricky position.
Yeah, and Rodger Mitchell, we know, always has great, great
(35:04):
opinions. You know, you got to speak to
him, you know, a couple months back up in your event in Sweden,
you know, he took this post and kind of put his own spin on a
contam. But this is actually maybe a bit
of a warning sign. And again, talking about that
squeezed middle mantra, the sortof the idea that if you can't
find pan European deals, like, you know, that that's actually
problematic. You know, that's that's sort of
(35:25):
emblematic of sort of the state of play of things and almost
like wanting to own moments. Like El Classico's still a big
game, but like no one else's, you know, no one else's
interest. The other ones, you know, went
so far as to say, like, are broadcasters just going to leave
you behind because there's so much media content?
You know, you went further to say, like, does Major League
Baseball have too many games? Like, at what stage do you know,
(35:46):
we talk about Netflix wants to own moments.
Netflix doesn't want the whole season because, you know, we use
baseball, for example, 162 games, most of them, unless
you're the local fan, they don'tcarry that sort of gravitas.
You know, the the Netflix wants the Christmas game.
Amazon wants the Black Friday game.
Like is sports perhaps getting to a point there actually is too
(36:06):
much sports that people really just they don't want all that.
They just want the moments. Well, I mean, the Roger's spot
on. And I think this is this has
been happening in front of our eyes for quite a while now.
But in in the case of Liga, whatwould be the best way to
maximise the value? Again, to your point, like there
is a bunch of teams that I don'teven know what they're called.
I would never be interested in watching a game between those
(36:27):
two. Somehow the Premier League has
done a great job of building up those those second tier 13
teams. So there's still an interest in
following them for some fans. But if you splice and dice the
Liga properly, you basically sell El Classico stand alone to
someone. You would get a huge check, but
the problem is that no one else would get any visibility.
(36:48):
And that and that's why having centralised said rights is great
because it keeps the IT keeps everything balanced.
But is it maximising the value of each and every game they have
available to them? More?
Probably. Probably not.
If they could sell that Classicoalone to Netflix or or one of
the major platforms, they would probably be worth a tidy, tidy
sum and they'd be willing to payfor it because it it is such a
(37:09):
big moment in European football.But all the others would cry
foul because particularly if themoney wasn't getting distributed
equally, but but also because they will be sitting back with
no visibility of their games. Because there's not, not that,
not that global interest in those second and third tier
teams. So a really tricky predicament,
(37:30):
not just for La Liga obviously, but like for, you know,
Bundesliga is facing some challenges with obviously you
have buying being so dominant for so long, it takes away that
competitive edge that makes it appealing to watch more matches.
The French league's obviously been in trouble and we've had
we've seen what sort of moves they've had to make in the UK to
try and get visibility. They can't even get a low tier
(37:50):
broadcast deal with your Sky Sports the world.
I mean that that says that's gotto say something.
Yeah, I think that was part of Richard's comment.
I mean, or, sorry, Roger's comment, he literally said if
I'm a broadcaster and I have oneor the other, or both Premier
League and Champions League, I actually don't have to pay for
anything else. And that it that that itself is
probably a little bit problematic if broadcasters view
(38:12):
it as I just don't even need you.
Yeah. Well, I think we live in this on
demand world as well, right? We're having just being by
building legacy programming models on the fact of just
having something something on isneeded on your linear networks
while in streaming it's just notas important.
People just go to you're just a tile on a screen these days.
They'll just go to something else to watch.
(38:32):
If there's nothing else I reallywant to watch rather than, you
know, like staying on and watching 1/3 tier league match
after a Premier League match. I just don't think it has the
same pool that it used to. Yeah, well, sidebar, I didn't
prep you for this one. Did you follow the story about
the Barcelona game that was supposed to play in Miami that
then got cancelled because of the fans?
(38:53):
I haven't read the story. I saw the headline.
I'm not reading the story. What's the what was the, is it
basically the the the Barsa fansthemselves kicking up a stink?
I think it was legal wide and I think one of the issues that
really kicked it off is the players started protesting.
It's like in the game of something like the players took
a knee for like 15 seconds during the actual game to
protest it. So it wasn't even just like
(39:14):
obviously strong fans, but even the players were.
But again, it goes this idea of La Liga, probably it's an NFL
model, right? Like the NFL wants to grow
globally. So like they're playing in
Mexico, they're playing in Spain, they're playing in
Germany, they're playing in the UK, they're going to go play in
Australia. But La Liga, like they can't
even get one game out of, you know, their 38 game schedule.
I don't know exactly how many they play compared to the
(39:36):
Premier League to go play abroadjust in an effort, in an attempt
to try and, you know, build somerevenue.
And I get it, right. Like I understand what fans are,
but it just it goes this whole thing like they can't, I don't
want to say get out of their ownway because like obviously you
have to respect the fans and theplayers, but at the same time,
like it's hard to grow if like you can't even do that.
(39:59):
Well, it's a challenge for a fewreasons, but also I think it's
important to note that in Latin America La Liga is still quite
strong as, as that second tier thing like in that market, the
IT probably usurps Premier League in a lot of markets.
I'm not sure every which ones they they do and don't.
And so obviously there's a huge Latin American influence in
Miami and across across the US. Really, you've got to remember
(40:21):
the Liga is a very, very nice looking deal with ESPN that is
worth I think like a billion or two.
I'd be frightened about what that's worth in the next renewal
period. Because if they can't get games
happening there to build more fandom and interest and prove to
ESPN and other broadcaster in the US that hey, we have an
(40:42):
audience here that wants to watch us play more, that again
is going to make it really difficult for them to get that
renewal done to the level that they need.
It's, I mean, building that balance between fans that you
were talking about is the biggest challenge footballers
facing now because they have board, you call themselves like
falling in bed with investment and taking extra equity and cash
(41:02):
and all this stuff into it, putting huge pressure on the
finances. They have to, they require
they're mandated by their ownership groups and everyone to
draw grow more revenue, revenue,revenue across the league.
This this is what happens as a result of that.
You start what you've got like, I don't know, there's some sort
of metaphor I could probably come up with like ringing
something too long before all the waters dried up.
(41:25):
I think this is kind of inevitable state of it.
And a lot of them, I use the example all the time, like the
Man United example with fans where they got so sick of the
existing ownership because they were rid layering the club with
debt and, you know, basically doing it for their own own
devices to basically secure, youknow, income themselves.
That was the that was the narrative.
(41:46):
And that's not going to go down with fans.
And this kind of has the same feeling of it.
The fans just don't like to be taken for a ride ultimately.
Yeah, well, again, another short.
Nick, I don't know if you saw it.
Did you see Real Madrid is trying to sue FIFA or sorry, not
FIFA, UEFA for $4 billion? Just 4 billion.
I did see that I hadn't read that article, but I mean, it
(42:08):
shows how messy the state of football is.
And just a final point back to going full circle back to this
La Liga challenge is that is whythis whole European Super League
thing came out. Like if, if they want to knock
Premier League off the perch, let's face it, Premier League is
#1 by a long, long, long way nowin terms of interest, even
(42:29):
across Europe. The only way they're going to
knock them off their perch is for something completely
out-of-the-box. But there's no way that it's
going to work because of all thefinancial I got a dependencies
on the current current model. So that's why the European Super
League popped up and to the top.We can have more pain and more
(42:49):
blood spilled before we get anywhere reasonable.
Let's just make a Brexit joke, Nick, because we can, we can
just, you can sell the European Super League and you just don't
include the English teams, right?
Well, that's what I'm actually thinking they should seriously
do though. I seriously think they should
double down on that and and justignore and like try and be a
rival with it. I think that would actually get
some serious viewership, but. Here you go.
(43:13):
Yeah, It could become a Ryder Cup style where you have the
English teams, then play those those European teams in the
European Super League and like, here we go, Nick, someone hire
us. They're.
Just going to get a few billion from somewhere to get started to
pay all these. Extra fees, but you know, we'll
just call someone else I'm. Still got a few investors
listening to this. Yeah, I'm sure we'll get some
investors listening to this guy.Genius.
(43:34):
Guys, I'm on. I'm on the case.
Give me, give me a few weeks. Can't wait.
Well, everyone, I do appreciate you tuning in for another
episode of Stream TIME Sports. It's been a pleasure, Nick.
For those that don't know, this won't be the last time you hear
my voice this year. The magic of Hollywood.
But I'm going on paternity for the next two months.
So this is the last episode, Nick, you and I are going to do
for a while. But we still have plenty of
content. You and I have already built up
(43:55):
a Bank of stuff. We'll have content from the
Media Summit in Madrid as well. But yeah, this is this is my
last time. Signing off for a little bit,
Nick. It it is indeed.
Now I do think we might have, dowe have maybe not episode that
pops up with yeah, your voice will pop up on a few episodes
randomly over the next. Couple of months.
Yeah, yeah, but, and I will be doing a few solo.
Well, not solo, actually. We'll be listening to monologues
(44:16):
of Mick Meacham for for an hour.That would be, that'd be
frightening. And I'd be worried for you all
if I decided to do that something.
I'll do that sort of initiative.But yeah, look, it's I've always
enjoyed doing this with you, Chris.
I'm looking forward to picking up the mic again with you soon
once you get to the next couple of months.
But all the best for that periodof time and I look forward to
(44:38):
hearing how it's all gone and hopefully you've got some sleep
through it all. And yeah, we'll talk.
We'll talk afterwards. Absolutely.
I'll try my best. But yeah, one of those episodes,
Nick, is our 200th episodes, so.That's right, you'll.
Get you'll get to hear lots of feedback.
You know, we won't go into in this one.
Enjoy that one. But yes, there'll be lots of
looking back on some of the stuff that we have done Nick.
And then, you know, 2026, we've already got plans for noon.
Big things, right? We do, we are going to change
(45:00):
things up and add some extra layers and dimensions to the
show. So stay tuned for that.
I have to just say that the, the200 episode we have, we have
recorded, we have lost track of how many episodes we've done
because we can't find a single source of truth.
So we're not sure if we actuallyrecorded the 200th ages ago, but
ignore that and just think of when you do hear the 200th
(45:21):
episode drop, that that is the that is the that is definitely
possibly maybe the 200th episode.
Yeah, we've recorded. But a little look and reflection
on where we are as an industry and what we've seen over the
last couple of years. So it should be.
It's a fun listen. Awesome.
Thank you everybody. Thanks everyone.
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