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Italian Football TV Rights SCANDAL - ‘Serie A Can’t Sell Lifejackets On The Titanic’ (Ep. 447)
1.9k Plays10 months ago
After the Serie A and their partner InFront Sports & Media fail to sell TV rights for 2024/2025 season to several countries who combined account for over 2 billion of the population of the world, Nima Tavallaey and Carlo Garganese discuss, debate and criticize how and why it got to this as well as who is responsible.
This is an extended clip from this weeks free Monday episode of The Italian Football Podcast which is available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and Google podcasts.
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Transcript
Introduction to the Serie A TV Rights Scandal
00:00:03
Speaker
Welcome to the Italian football podcast. We have to talk about the Serie A TV rights scandal because it is a scandal. um I mean, this crisis has plumbed to new debts. A new Serie A season has begun and there are numerous big markets internationally, and big countries around the world who don't have TV rights and for Serie A and it is absolutely shocking. There's lots of anger around the world among Italian football fans. um I've just been speaking to a lot of fans and a lot of lot of people from those markets. um i mean four Some of them now have it because lots of them... you know Yeah, lots of last minute these deals, which which I'll come
Impact on Global Markets
00:00:47
Speaker
to. I mean, 48 hours before the season started,
00:00:50
Speaker
Here are some of the big countries that did not have TV rights. India, home to 1.4 billion people. Indonesia, 375 million people. Australia, with a huge Italian population. Malaysia, France, most of Scandinavia. Austria, Hungary, Nigeria, Morocco, much of South America. Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Barbados. I mean, I could go on and on and on. That's like two billion people. That's over two billion people. I mean, it's just now. I could go on and on and on.
00:01:20
Speaker
As Nima said though, Serie A managed to do some last-minute deals, which I frankly was very surprised on considering it's Veracosto and usually Italians, let alone Italians at the leg of Serie A, usually you don't You don't hear from them for the days or weeks when it's better. cool stuff So I'm frankly surprised that they managed to close some of these laws with it. know Australia, apparently they close four hours before the season started.
Suboptimal TV Deals Worldwide
00:01:45
Speaker
Australia, New Zealand, that is. yeah Yes, Australia, New Zealand. India um secured a frankly embarrassing deal from what I've been told, speaking to can say ah Italian journalists, football journalists in in ah in India.
00:02:00
Speaker
um with an online e-sports company to show Serie A matches online, but they can only watch the games online on computer, only on computer. There's no working app yet. And the deal came so late that basically the company, through no fault of their own, really, ah were not ready. They're not ready for it. So there's nothing, do the yeah, exactly. They loved it on TV. Apparently the first games, lots of complaints about quality and sound. A couple of the games, apparently, I found this hilarious, there was double commentary on them.
00:02:34
Speaker
somehow, how is that even possible? Like, ah double, double commentary. That was um um amazing. Great guys. i love that I love them. They were they were making fun of it. ah Of course they were. It's hilarious. Which is brilliant. um I also like that Poland, Poland, I was speaking to a journalist, Marcin, lovely guy, who covers Serie A in Poland. He sent me a voice note saying that Poland has the first match day But nobody knows if they will have it any other more than anything else the rest of the season. It's unclear if they have the rights after that. I don't know how the hell that works out, how you can have match rights for the first day of the season. Well, I can tell you how, if what they've done with the UK and Northern Ireland is is very instructive of how they they do deals. It's like the UK deal is just a
Broadcast Challenges and Confusion
00:03:24
Speaker
joke. if They've turned the Serie A rights into some sort of a cow that's been slaughtered with the prime cuts go to TNT, the two games a week.
00:03:31
Speaker
And then the rest is is is on ah is on one football, but some of it is free, some of it you have to pay for, nobody knows how much. That's an OTT as well. That's that firm over the top. It means basically online. like It's online streaming, yeah, online, yeah.
00:03:47
Speaker
yeah it's just it's well it's unclear actually nobody actually knows with that either because i mean that was secured a few hours before the season started as well um and it's free for the first weekend so that those eight matches that you said are free everybody can can can watch them online but nobody knows yet as far as i know um what will be the cost afterwards, you know, will will you have to I mean, it seems like it's because the other two games this weekend, the ones that were on TV, TNT, so the inter general game and the Roma calorie game, you could buy them on on football for $4.99. So it's unclear whether
00:04:27
Speaker
I would imagine, because they're going to have to make their money back somehow, that people are going to have to pay for this. It's not going to be free from match day two onwards. Will it be pay per view? That seems to be the suggestion. It's going to be pay per view. But nobody knows right now. Maybe it will be. But then they have to do like they can't just charge people for getting they need to create a season pass or something because it'd be too expensive and no one's gonna no one's gonna pay for that either. So yeah, I mean, I watched, I watched a couple of games on on football. The Fiorentina game first game Fiorentina I had on, there was no commentary in the first half, but the commentary suddenly appeared.
00:05:06
Speaker
in the second half. um and And then it was I was watching a bit of the Roma game and it was it was free it it it was freezing a little bit. It kept freezing now and again um as well. I mean, that could just be you know growing pains first week all that kind of stuff you knows well the city i don't know they need that i mean i we know did you watch did you i know that happened with the zone i know to zone it's no no no did you yeah i was gonna say did you watch milan toino in the middle of the second half when it went
00:05:37
Speaker
blank on what on what network Well, it was it was the serial that went blank. Oh, they were the ones producing it or the design or whoever is producing. It just it just said test, test or whatever. It was great. And and I thought it was just me. But I saw in online that everyone watching was like, ah what the design has been a but the design has been a running joke. I mean, that's all again on Syria. I mean, everybody makes fun of it. It's the other time. So I don't know who's producing it. So they call it the CIA.
00:06:04
Speaker
But so I mean, yeah, so I mean, we'll see what happens with the UK. But that the point is that this has just been so badly handled in the whole team. Sweden, Sweden, Sweden, Sweden has one Norway, it's only on I think you can go on and it's a newspaper, it's a national newspaper that's bought the rights only streaming online.
00:06:26
Speaker
But Sweden, it's a bit it's one of the it's a network that's had it for the last year or so that are going to have it for the next two seasons. They they closed that the day before. Yeah, it's not been handled well. It's been handled. Obviously, there's the value of the deals as well, which is important that I mean, that is probably the most well, it's the most important in terms of finances, but also, as has been, we've said so many times before, it's not just about going for the best financial deal, because that you have to be able to sell to someone who can put on, it could you know, has a good product. and and And because that's what
Criticism of Serie A's TV Rights Management
00:06:59
Speaker
helps the market and grow the league. And if you sell, sell to someone who can't put on a good show,
00:07:03
Speaker
then you're actually, you know which is what happened in India in some of the last recent rights cycles. um And then in the last one in that nobody was actually able to watch the game and it wasn't promoted and then and then really you're not growing the league are you so it's it's there's a lot of variables there, but But just so everybody understands and Because I did put out a tweet on Thursday which went viral and there's a lot of anger about how bad that badly it's been handled who handles the international TV rights sales, so so
00:07:35
Speaker
Basically the lega seria and a sports marketing agency called in front sports the way has been handled in recent years as they divide the selling and negotiating of TV rights between them. Now, the League of Serie A generally takes care or has until now ah taken care of the big markets like the US, MENA, which is the Middle East and North Africa, the UK, as far as I understand. In front sports until now generally have done much of the rest of the world, including the Asian market.
00:08:08
Speaker
um Now, my understanding is that they are now working more closely together since Anna Guanherio, who is the the head of international TV rights at Lego Serie A, seria um until she was since she became the head of international TV rights there, for over 20 years before that, she was at Infront. So the two organisations basically work together. I mean, the buck stops with Anna, of course, ah and it's being terribly, terribly handled. Terribly, terribly handled. well I mean, that's a title, isn't it? She's the head of international TV rights at Lego Seria. Yeah. I mean, I've been speaking to a lot of people and I've been told that the Lego only started talks.
00:08:52
Speaker
over, I'm not going to name the the the country because i I don't want to give away ah the sort of sources, but I've been told that League only started talks over a few of these big countries, which which I've listed before a few of the bigger markets three weeks ago.
00:09:14
Speaker
Anna, Anna herself, that is. So, um you know, I'm not again, I don't want to put it all on Anna because I know there are cultural issues which we'll come to in a minute. But that is embarrassing. You know, why are you starting ah to negotiate but i mean you write three weeks before the season starts? Why so late? Why didn't you do it months ago? Why didn't you do it the start of the year? They didn't even do it with their biggest prized asset, which they love the most, the the the Americans that are going to save us.
00:09:43
Speaker
they didn't They didn't start that. when When did that deal become clear? I'm not i'm not sure. Was it a week ago? like Five days ago? Four days ago? I mean, this is what they do. yeah this is It's always last minute deals. And from what I've heard and understood, CBS basically one told them, we're not paying you what you want. And they got whatever they want. Financially, it was a terrible deal. I know there are reasons for that, um did the whole climate.
00:10:10
Speaker
you know and and you know I don't want to sit here and criticize the Americans. I actually think when it comes to marketing, you know what they do, even the guys at CBS, I think that they do ah as good a job at any it trying to actually market the league, trying to actually... Oh, I disagree with that profoundly. Listen, we can talk about how they do it, whether you like it, but in terms of actually putting themselves out there... Do you reach new audiences or not with your marketing? Or do you keep preaching to the choir? That's what I'm interested in. I'm interested in growing. I'm interested in talking and finding new audiences that you retain. That to me is successful marketing. Preaching to the choir,
00:10:53
Speaker
over and over and over again to people who already love the seria because they have a cultural historical family heritage that is is is is is good because you need to keep your base happy like when we interviewed the ceo of seria um in north america that's great i'm not interested in the base i mean because you've got the base and you need to take care of them you need to respect them all of that is true what i'm interested is in is how are you going to
Marketing and Piracy Concerns
00:11:21
Speaker
reach new audiences? And the answer to that has been to pay lots of money to bringing these idiots who cook naked, who cook Italian food naked, or I show speed, who plays the whoever talks is gay game with Zlatan. That is the strategy, apparently. that That seems to be the tone of what they're going after.
00:11:41
Speaker
up that is but that it's not its it's that's a nonor point What I meant was that at least that they are ah making noise, let's let's say, whereas in these other markets. Well, when people make noise that no one wants to hear, then it's essentially yelling out, yelling into the ether. That's my point. What is your strategy to reach new markets and to retain them, not just flash in the pan, a bunch of likes on Instagram? No. What is your long-term strategy and short-term strategy to grow the popularity of the city in the United States and Canada? Cause I, again, I believe
00:12:19
Speaker
firmly that this is this people like Italy it's one of the few things most people on this planet agree on is that Italy is a place that most people have a very positive connotation to when they think of Italy, whether it's the food, the weather, the history, the fashion, the the music, all of these things, and the football. I agree with you. What I'm saying is I'm talking about, first of all, but I'm talking about the whole process here. I'm talking about selling the rights, actually getting the rights done, and then those markets actually being able to to to to to to actually
00:12:53
Speaker
at least be it you know visible let's say in in these look in india for example they're not visible there's no visibility at all so whether you agree with how let's for example cbs do things what you know their whole marketing strategy and all that.
00:13:09
Speaker
That's another talking point. That's that's further down the line. At least they're visible at least has visibility at least that they're trying to make some noise That's what I'm saying. I'm talking about that stuff. So then there's another then there's another talk about further down the line how the whole so you feel That's what I'm saying about your bar. The bar is yes With Loris O'Lo, it is literally the souls of Satan's foot in hell.
00:13:36
Speaker
most of most of the i know lots of people intonian by then most of people and will'll come to pirus soon and most of most of the italian football fans have already gone out and bought iptv but because they want to watch the games. It's too late. So they've already lost those. But that's, you know, Malaysia, I've been told they started a few weeks ago to talk about. I've got a really good friend that lives in Malaysia who moved out there with his wife, Italian, from Bedford. He's the guy that, remember, I went to the 2006 World Cup with, who missed three of Italy's goals during the tournament because I wouldn't let him watch the corner kick. Is that the poor guy you terrorised in 2006? Yes, yes. He's the one that I demanded not watch the court. Yeah, we're against the Czech Republic. Yeah, because I said that Italy would score if he didn't watch, and they did. And then I wouldn't let him watch. Jesus, you are a menace. You are a menace. I wouldn't let him watch the Totti Golf. You ruined the World Cup for him. That's what you did. yeah but we won it we won the world cup so it was better yeah i mean you could have you could have watched it and we then went out you know you could have watched the totty penalty against australia and we missed it and we went out so it has no correlation literally no correlation well i i stopped him from watching the pilo corner which led to the which led to the groso go as well you are a terrorist he missed three goals he missed three goals in the tour anyway he lives in malaysia
00:14:58
Speaker
He moved to moved to Malaysia to get away from you. i mean he lives at his name jappy He lives in Malaysia and he yeah yeah they they still don't have they still don't have the rights. They are furious and it's a massive Italian population. Indonesia is the biggest Islamic country in the world. A lot of people don't know that. But it's the biggest it's you know there's lots of people who live there.
00:15:20
Speaker
and they don't you know They don't have the right, from what I understand, as of today when we're recording, there's no rights there. No, they are absolutely furious. the interclub The Interclub of Indonesia has, I don't know how many hundreds of sub-chapters They have 80,000 members paying members something like that. That's just that's just in there like yeah the Milan you were and then like it's I've actually got I've actually got a quote here and I'm gonna read it out because if he asked me it's from and from his friend Charan Jits Singh who is the head of the official
00:15:55
Speaker
You've always always one of the one of the main guys at the official you've a fan club Malaysia, and which is absolutely huge just like the and yeah the said and he I read out his quote because he he asked if I couldn't said look my message to in front and the idiots running the TV rights distribution You are the reason seria is called the farmer's league as they can't even get their act together and leave huge swathes of seria fans in Asia in alert Pretty soon. We will share similarities with the area divisi Turkish super league and the Portuguese League. I mean, they they are absolutely furious. Of course they are. And rightly rightly so. um And I think that one of the reasons, absolutely, is that Leka spent so much time worrying about America, thinking, America is going to save us. And even then, the deal that they did with CPS, you know,
00:16:46
Speaker
there are reasons why it's so low, but the the deal financially is is really not good. And we don't even know what the financial figures are of these last minute deals they've done. you know They're probably not very good either, I would imagine. um And then you know that plummeted from the last deal. um So you know why on earth they they they spend all that time worrying on America when they
Negotiation and Management Accountability
00:17:06
Speaker
didn't even get a good deal? And then you know all these other big markets. They only started three weeks ago. I mean, the Premier League, the Bundesliga, which are competently run organisations, they started these talks, secured these deals months ago. You know, beginning of the year, they would be starting talks for the new right cycle. You know, start three months, three weeks before the season starts. I mean, it's just embarrassing. And that's why I say they cannot sell life jackets on the Titanic. Serie A cannot sell life jackets on the Titanic.
00:17:40
Speaker
No, they can't. They're awful. They're awful at it. um And it's time to name it. It's time to name and shame them. I'm sorry. I know, you know, some people, some people that have ties to Saria were a little bit unhappy that I named and a Guinario, but I'm sorry, but the problem is that first of all, the buck stops with her. She's she she is the head is the head of of international TV. tv rights She needs to be answerable. She she should be explaining herself. The problem that we have in Italy, it's with Italian football, with Serie A is that when there are these fuck ups, when there are these scandals,
00:18:13
Speaker
There's no one is no one ever comes out. And then there's no there's no names. There's no faces. no's No, there's no way it's just all serious. No, but it's not. It's just that's it. Gravena gets it all. And he's I'm not saying that he's any good. i ah but But you know, it's always just it's just Gravena. It's just a serie as a whole. It's just Italy as a country. We need to name name. I mean, it is a cultural problem as well. There's no doubt that but we need to start naming names on a Guinario.
00:18:39
Speaker
Answer yourself what what is going on? Why the hell is this such a mess, you know and Others as well, but we always make fun of them of the of the marketing, you know, the marketing is a joke in Syria It's a complete and utter joke. Just look at look at the Twitter account and the absolute you know Just listen to our serious of the week every week and see that the fuckups that go on on social media when they're marketing It's just embarrassing Miguel Cicaresi is the commercial and marketing director. i've been told by few people but he's one of the main mencing I've been told by a few people, he's always in New York, he's always in the Middle East, he's always rubbing shoulders with all the former players and he does nothing. His job is to commercially grow the league outside of Italy. How does he commercially grow the league? And he goes and that everybody goes boasting that they're conquering America, they're conquering the world.
00:19:26
Speaker
You know, the head of social media and all the goons working for them. I want to know who the name is. I want to know who is the person responsible for these people on social media that they're embarrassed to leave every single week with someone. Last week, what did they do last week, Nimr? In the middle of when there's hardly any rights sold to half two billion people on Earth.
00:19:45
Speaker
they go talking about how piracy kills football. Like there's being tone deaf and then there's being, I don't know what that is. they that was theirff That was their campaign for match day one and match day two of Serie A. You see it before the games. Piracy kills football in Italian. in italian I mean, a piracy campaign when you haven't sold any TV rights. I mean, you've just got to laugh. What are the pirates stealing? There's nothing to steal. You haven't sold it. You haven't sold anything. I mean, you know what it's like? It's like a farmer blaming insects for destroying his crops when he never gives any of the crops any fertilizer or any sunlight or water, moisture, you know, they're never going to grow. Then you blame the insects. exactly that's what it's like and then of course area becomes a farmer's league there we go nice little nice little you came full circle there yeah no but it's i agree with that i agree with with with everything you said there and i think that it's not just the appointments and the people in charge i think there needs to be accountability across the board and i think when you look at how the Bundesliga handles themselves and how they systematically there's what i love about german football is how
00:20:57
Speaker
rational they are and how bluntly matter of fact they are about the facts. They know their place in the food chain, they want to grow, they set up realistic targets long term and then they try to build towards that and then they move the entire German ecosystem towards that from stadiums to and this is in a league where it's fan owned. Like most of the clubs are not businesses, they're owned by the community still.
00:21:25
Speaker
And you look at how I mean, just look at the production quality of a Bundesliga game there in 2024. Italy's in 1984. Yeah. And then you look at. Wasn't there a massive technical error before the inter-game as well, like to start the season? yeah yeah no they like like the there once yeah and then And then the referee couldn't get the VAR thing to... Whatever. And um the goal on technology wasn't working for the Milan game as well. know that With was the goal that got given, um apparently as well. Luckily they they make the right decision. But you know but anyway, that's another talk we brought together. But yeah, no, it's it's um it's it's it's stuff like this that is so easily sorted.
00:22:04
Speaker
that they just don't have the infrastructure in place to take care of. and And the reason why we're naming people is because somewhere the buck has to stop. This is something that I find utterly astonishing with Italian media is that nobody is talking about this. They only talk about the domestic rights. They don't. And it's it's as if. But there is another there is a world out there. You're competing on a global scale.
00:22:34
Speaker
You're not just competing with the Premier League in Italy. You're competing with the Premier League everywhere and everyone else everywhere. And so that's what, you know, they don't talk about this and it needs to be talked about. And we know why it's not talked about.
00:22:48
Speaker
because you you you risk pissing off a lot of powerful people and and and they don't want to you know they want they'd rather ignore it and silence it to death. And and they're just working for themselves as well. That's that's what they're working for. you know it's they're not exhausting that It's exhausting that they don't do that because that that that this is not a bigger scandal because I mean, I'll tell you this much, if if the Premier League failed to secure rights abroad in big markets and and had to resort to this,
00:23:18
Speaker
They would be an absolute scandal. The British media would be all over it. And I'm not saying the British media are any better, but they would be slaughtering them. The F.A. for this.
00:23:29
Speaker
oh and called head would roll as well page would roll People would have to resign. You'd see organizational changes. You'd see structural changes because it's a cash cow that brings in lots of revenue and tax revenue. It's part of the global branding of the England as ah in the world. And so it's important for them to maintain you know, that, but you know, a good service level and and a good quality. Exactly. right then And then that comes all down to the finances. And that's why, you know, Serie A teams have no money. And that's why we don't buy any plays. I mean, that's the last. We're just really more talking about, you know, serving your actual, your your fans. Allow them to actually be able to watch the games. Are we able to to allow allow our fans to watch the actual matches? Forget about the money. No, no, seriously. And then they talk about piracy. They they they say that piracy is killing football.
00:24:19
Speaker
No, piracy is not killing football when you can't even sell the rights. like What are you talking about? What are you on about? You can't even shore up your own base. The people who love your league, who will watch your league no matter what. You can't even get your product to them. That is the level we're talking about here. Then we can talk about long-term growth and reaching new audiences. But you can't even preach to the converted.
00:24:46
Speaker
You can't even sell the product to the people who want your product globally. It's just insane.