#12 '24: top-10 Football leagues, historical milestones, record breaking ratings, and more.

TOP-3 HIGHLIGHTS?

#1 TOP-10 GLOBAL LEAGUES

According to Opta, the MLS is now amongst the top 10 strongest leagues in the world. Check out the full ranking?here.?

#2 MILESTONE?

This weekend’s Louisville City game against Indy Eleven will make history as the first USL game televised on free, over-the-air television courtesy of CBS. It’s part of CBS’s new broadcast deal with the USL that puts over 100 games across CBS platforms.

#3 DOUBLING DOWN (LITERALLY)

As advertiser demand for women’s sports skyrockets thanks to growth in ratings, interest from young fans and the star power of female athletes,?GroupM?is looking to boost this momentum. The WPP-owned agency announced a commitment to?double?its investments in women’s sports and intentions to seek exclusive deals with media companies that host women’s sports programming.

Other relevant US Soccer and Global Football business news

US?

Lionel Messi’s casual clothing brand is being taken over by Centric Brands, a clothing maker owned by private equity giant Blackstone that also licenses clothing and accessory brands including Nautica, Kate Spade and Izod.

Still on Messi,?he's now teaming up with the creator of iconic White Claw Hard Seltzer for a "game-changing, non-alcoholic hydration beverage like no other" according to their?press release.

Sarah Jones Simmer, a longtime executive in the tech industry, was named the chief operating officer of the NWSL.?

NWSL expansion franchise Bay FC unveiled a ‘US$500k’ Sixth Street jersey sponsorship deal. The club also announced partnerships with Visa, Meriwest Credit Union and Lyft.?Sixth Street is a global investment firm founded in San Francisco with over 600 team members operating around the world. Last year in co-founding Bay FC, Sixth Street led the largest institutional investment ever made in a women’s professional sports franchise. ? US private equity firm Arctos raised US$4.1bn for a second sports investment fund -- the company's sports team portfolio includes powerhouses such as Paris Saint-Germain and the Golden State Warriors.

Manchester City v Arsenal set a new US viewership record for a Premier League match, with an average 2.12m viewers watching across NBC, Peacock and NBC Sports Digital.

UK

The Premier League has agreed a four-year licensing and investment tie-up with virtual reality software firm Rezzil. Through the agreement, the league will take an equity stake in Manchester-based Rezzil, while the two will also work together to develop an EPL-centric game, to launch later this year.

Aston Villa ended its sponsorship?with gambling firm BK8 in favour of a club record partnership with Betano for UK￡40m for a front-of-shirt sponsorship.?

US private equity firm Bright Path Sports Partners?secured a 40% stake in English second-tier football club Ipswich Town for a UK￡105m investment.?

On a similar note, League One side Reading have confirmed that club owner Dai Yongge has reached an agreement with a prospective buyer. No formal announcement on the identity of the prospective buyer is available at this time. Nevertheless, three groups emerged in the last few weeks as possible suitors. There is the Wilf family, owners of the Minnesota Vikings,?Sports.com, a US ownership group and the third option mentioned was Genevra Associates, an investment management firm based in Luxembourg.

The UK's?Women's Super League is set for a record ‘UK￡9m per year’ Barclays sponsorship deal -- the three-year extension is worth around double the existing contract.

In related news, public-service BBC and pay-TV heavyweight Sky, are close to striking one-year extensions to their present WSL coverage deals, which expire at the end of the ongoing 2023-24 campaign, meaning that the competition will continue to be aired domestically in the upcoming 2024-25 season.

Scottish Premiership club Motherwell are in negotiations with an American family to become?investors in the club.?

DENMARK?

Amazon struck a deal for 38 Premier League matches in Sweden and Denmark until 2027/28 -- the Saturday lunchtime games will be exclusive to the platform thanks to Viaplay sublicensing deal.

FRANCE

Ligue 1 confirmed McDonald’s as new title sponsor, replacing Uber Eats in a three-season, ‘€90m’ pact starting from 2024/25.

ITALY

DAZN extended TimVision Serie A distribution deal -- ten weekly games will be shown on the telecom giant's platform for the next five seasons until 2029.

The heavyweight Sky Italia pay-TV broadcaster has unveiled an extension to its exclusive rights deal covering the English Premier League for another three seasons. The renewal, confirmed late last week, will see Sky Italia continue to exclusively cover the 20-team EPL until the end of the 2027-28 campaign.

NETHERLANDS?

Ajax’s calamitous season worsened when the Amsterdam club suspended new CEO Alex Kroes on Tuesday and said it intends to fire him on suspicion of insider trading in the club’s shares.

BRAZIL

flamengo striker Gabriel “Gabigol” Barbosa has been suspended following a doping investigation in Brazil.

Botafogo's American owner John Textor accused reigning champion Palmeiras of benefiting from a match-fixing system.?He also claimed that two Brazilian league matches played against Palmeiras in 2022 and 2023 had nine players from Fortaleza and Sao Paulo who were questionably underperforming. In a statement, Palmeiras announced that they had filed a complaint in response to Textor’s remarks this week. Fortaleza and Sao Paulo also expressed their interest in taking legal action against Textor on Monday.

SOUTH KOREA

The Korean Football Association (KFA) has announced that they will implement a full promotion/relegation system by 2027.

UEFA

UEFA has unveiled AliExpress, the online retail service owned by Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba, as a commercial partner of its men’s European Championship national teams tournament this year.

GLOBAL MEDIA?

Yahoo Sports and OneFootball have agreed to create a new hub for soccer content in the US.? Footballco has agreed a new partnership with North American soccer’s NWSL for the next three seasons.

About SOCCER FC

Soccer FC is a free weekly newsletter that I write as a hobby, where I summarize the most interesting news I've read throughout the week about the business of Global Football and US Soccer. I'm not the one writing any of these articles, therefore everything is properly linked to its original sources, making sure we all give credit and value its original writers. Have fun!