SOCCER
Record TV deal for EPL
The English Premier League (EPL) on Monday announced that it had agreed a record ￡6.7 billion (US$8.46 billion) domestic television rights deal for a four-year period starting from the 2025-2026 season. The current deal is reported to be worth about ￡5 billion over a three-year cycle and covers 200 matches per season. Sky Sports and TNT Sports retained their rights to show live matches, with Amazon not part of the next cycle. Sky would screen a minimum of 215 live matches per season, while TNT would broadcast 52. BBC Sport is to broadcast highlights via its Match of the Day program. A Saturday afternoon blackout, designed to protect attendances in the lower leagues, would remain, but for the first time all matches outside of those scheduled for 3pm on Saturday would be screened live.
OLYMPICS
‘No plan B’ after attack
The French government still plans to hold next year’s Paris Olympics opening ceremony on the River Seine, even after a deadly attack in the French capital at the weekend amplified existing security concerns. French Minister of Sports and Olympic and Paralympic Games Amelie Oudea-Castera said that the plan could still be adapted, as media reports indicated grave concern within the security forces that the ceremony could be vulnerable to attack. A man known to the authorities as a radical Islamist with mental troubles on Saturday stabbed to death a German tourist close to the Eiffel Tower by the River Seine. “There is no plan B, we have a plan A within which we have several alternatives,” Oudea-Castera told France Inter radio. The “terrorist threat and in particular the Islamist threat exists,” she said. “It is not new and it is neither specific to France nor specific to the Games.”
ICE HOCKEY
Neck guards compulsory
The International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) on Monday announced that it is making neck guards mandatory for all levels of competition in the tournaments it runs, including the Olympics and men’s and women’s world championships. The mandate would not apply to professional leagues, including the NHL. Any sort of mandate in the NHL would require an agreement between the league and players’ union. The IIHF’s move comes after the death of American Adam Johnson, whose neck was cut by a skate blade during a game in England in October. The exact date for the IIHF neck guard mandate to go into place is still to be determined.
RUGBY UNION
World Cup final ref quits
English referee Tom Foley, who received death threats after acting as television match official at the Rugby World Cup final, is to step away from officiating Test rugby for the foreseeable future. Foley was television match official for October’s final between South Africa and New Zealand in Paris, which the Springboks won 12-11. The 38-year-old said last month that death threats had been aimed at him and his family since the World Cup, and he had to warn his children’s school as a result. “While it is a privilege to be at the heart of some of the sport’s most iconic moments, the increasing levels of vitriol, when the demands and expectation are so high, have led me to this moment,” Foley said in a statement released by the Rugby Football Union on Monday.
The qualifying round of the World Baseball Classic (WBC) is to be held at the Taipei Dome between Feb. 21 and 25, Major League Baseball (MLB) announced today. Taiwan’s group also includes Spain, Nicaragua and South Africa, with two of the four teams advancing onto the 2026 WBC. Taiwan, currently ranked second in the world in the World Baseball Softball Confederation rankings, are favorites to come out of the group, the MLB said in an article announcing the matchups. Last year, Taiwan finished in a five-way tie in their group with two wins and two losses, but finished last on tiebreakers after giving
North Korea’s FIFA Under-17 Women’s World Cup-winning team on Saturday received a heroes’ welcome back in the capital, Pyongyang, with hundreds of people on the streets to celebrate their success. They had defeated Spain on penalties after a 1-1 draw in the U17 World Cup final in the Dominican Republic on Nov. 3. It was the second global title in two months for secretive North Korea — largely closed off to the outside world; they also lifted the FIFA U20 Women’s World Cup in September. Officials and players’ families gathered at Pyongyang International Airport to wave flowers and North Korea flags as the
For King Faisal, a 20-year-old winger from Ghana, the invitation to move to Brazil to play soccer “was a dream.” “I believed when I came here, it would help me change the life of my family and many other people,” he said in Sao Paulo. For the past year and a half, he has been playing on the under-20s squad for Sao Paulo FC, one of South America’s most prominent clubs. He and a small number of other Africans are tearing across pitches in a country known as the biggest producer and exporter of soccer stars in the world, from Pele to Neymar. For
Coco Gauff of the US on Friday defeated top-ranked Aryna Sabalenka 7-6 (7/4), 6-3 to set up a showdown with Olympic champion Zheng Qinwen in the final of the WTA Finals, while in the doubles, Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching was eliminated. Gauff generated six break points to Belarusian Sabalenka’s four and built on early momentum in the opening set’s tiebreak that she carried through to the second set. She is the youngest player at 20 to make the final at the WTA Finals since Denmark’s Caroline Wozniacki in 2010. Zheng earlier defeated Wimbledon champion Barbora Krejcikova of the Czech Republic 6-3, 7-5 to book
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