Spanish soccer’s top-flight LaLiga has signed a new tripartite agreement with Saudi Arabian broadcaster Thmanyah and the Riyadh Season sporting, cultural, and entertainment brand.
The deal, which will run across the 2025-26 campaign, will see LaLiga aid in enhancing the broadcast quality of the Saudi Pro League top flight, for which Thmanyah is the exclusive domestic broadcaster.
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Through the partnership, LaLiga will support the local audiovisual production teams through the sharing of knowledge and technical information.
LaLiga president Javier Tebas, speaking after the announcement of the partnership, commented: “We think the Saudi pro league is in an excellent position, but they also need to take another step forward to reach the level of excellence from a broadcast perspective, and that's where we feel like our experience can contribute to that growth.
“The [SPL} has started on an important strategic path, which is the signing of big players. That needs to be complemented by an improved broadcast spectacle to be enjoyed by spectators who are watching from home, and certainly having greater attendance at the stadiums as well.
“Proper investment in digital can incentivize attendance at both stadiums and, bit by bit, continue the growth trajectory, so it could become amongst the top six or seven leagues in the world.”
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By GlobalDataOn what advice LaLiga can bring to the Saudi Pro League (SPL) broadcast setup he added: “LaLiga is a league that has invested considerably in our growth from a broadcast perspective over the past 12 years. We're considered the league that offers the best audiovisual product in terms of our television broadcast, and we believe, in particular, that it's very important for the clubs to contribute their part to making sure that the television spectacle is the absolute best.
"[The SPL is] obviously starting from a really good starting point, which is AlamiyaMedia (the SPL’s production partner), which is a great content producer, but it's also important to work with those clubs so they understand how they are guarantors of the quality of the league.”
This mirrors LaLiga’s own content strategy, which has placed the onus on clubs to assist the league and its broadcast partners with strengthening the overall product.
Riyadh Season is already a commercial partner of LaLiga through a multi-year deal agreed in 2024, and this new accord strengthens the Spanish top flight’s association with soccer in Saudi Arabia.
Furthermore, in December, LaLiga opened an office within the SPL's headquarters in the Saudi capital of Riyadh.
Saudi Arabia has long sought to compete with the global elite of soccer, and it is likely that the Kingdom sees this partnership as another step towards presenting its on-field product in a fashion that is closer to that of Europe’s so-called top five leagues, of which LaLiga is one.
As such, earlier in 2025, the SPL hired Leonard Soler Batet, who for the last three years was the head of international media rights at Spanish soccer's top-tier LaLiga.
Throughout the 2024-25 campaign, the Saudi Pro League was shown in more than 165 countries on 43 global platforms.
Heavyweight sports marketing agency IMG has held international broadcast distribution rights for the last two seasons, and also has a production deal in place through 2028-29.
In terms of senior Spanish soccer executives moving to the SPL, meanwhile, Jesús Arroyo – up until January, the deputy general manager at LaLiga side Sevilla – is now an advisor to Omar Mugharbel, the SPL's chief executive.
Thmanyah is a subsidiary of Saudi Research and Media Group (SRMG), the country's state-backed media company.
