BeIN Sports, the international pay-TV sports broadcaster, has secured rights in France to show additional NFL programming to accompany its existing live coverage.
The multi-year deal will see BeIN show an extra match on Sundays at 10.25PM (CET) and the league’s weekly NFL Extra program on Tuesdays at 11PM.
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The additional programming accompanies BeIN’s rights to show three live matches per week on Monday, Thursday, and Sunday nights, as well as the NFL’s Red Zone, the channel which features live-action cut-ins as teams approach the opposition’s end zone, from 7PM on Sundays.
BeIN’s rights deal, first struck in 2012, covers regular-season and play-off matches and the Super Bowl and Pro Bowl Games.
Free-to-air rights to NFL in France are held by commercial broadcaster M6, which replaced digital terrestrial channel L’Equipe in July. The deal sees M6 show 18 regular-season matches live on 6play, three play-off matches on W9, and the flagship season-ending Super Bowl.
That agreement marked the return of the NFL to M6, with the broadcaster having previously aired the Super Bowl between 2010 and 2019. L’Equipe held FTA rights to the NFL between 2020 and 2022.
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By GlobalDataThe agreement comes after the New Orleans Saints were granted international marketing rights in France – the first NFL club selected and awarded the French market.
The program grants NFL clubs access to international markets for marketing, fan engagement, and commercialization activations as part of a long-term strategic effort to enable clubs to build their brands globally while driving NFL fan growth beyond the US.
NFL clubs can apply for rights to selected international markets by submitting proposals to the international committee annually.
Teams are awarded rights for at least a five-year term through the program. During this period, a club has rights to pursue activities in that international market “that are largely consistent with what they can do in their home market.”
The NFL is seeking to build its presence further in Europe after successfully staging a regular season game in Germany last year – a feat Brett Gosper, NFL’s head of UK and Europe, said the league is keen to replicate in France.
A sell-out crowd of 69,811 gathered at Allianz Arena, home of German soccer champions FC Bayern Munich, to watch the Tampa Bay Buccaneers beat the Seattle Seahawks last year. The league has since committed to staging at least three more games in Germany up until the 2025 season.
German broadcaster ProSieben generated a record 2.7 million viewers, making it the most-watched NFL regular season game ever in the country. DAZN Germany, meanwhile, said the game was the second most-watched NFL broadcast on its streaming platform after the Super Bowl.
Fanatics, the NFL’s official e-commerce partner and exclusive event retail operator in Europe, said gameday merchandise sales at Allianz Arena broke records for an NFL game outside the US.
The NFL, meanwhile, said its German social media channels gained 30,000 followers.
