Broadcasters across Europe, including the BBC and ITV, have averted a broadcast blackout of the football tournament, which starts next month.
The EBU – an alliance of European public service broadcasters – has extended its original broadcast deal with FIFA, which originally covered 28 countries, to cover 34 countries. As a result, EBU members BBC and ITV will now show live coverage of the event, which is being co-hosted by Australia and New Zealand.
In the UK, all 64 matches from the tournament, which starts in Auckland on 20th July, will be broadcast on either the BBC or ITV, except for the Final, which will be shown across both BBC One and ITV1. Previously, the Women’s World Cup was only shown on the BBC.
FIFA originally refused to award broadcast rights in a number of countries because the money offered by broadcasters was deemed insufficient, despite this year’s Women’s World Cup being held in Australia and New Zealand, meaning none of the games will be shown at peak times in Europe.
The EBU-broked deal also means public broadcasters in Germany (ARD/ZDF), France (France Télévisions), Italy (RAI) and Spain (RTVE) will now show the event, after also being threatened with a FIFA blackout.
▶ UK coverage: overview
- TV coverage will be split with half of all games on BBC One and BBC iPlayer and the other half either on ITV1 or ITV4 plus ITVX.
- Radio coverage will run on BBC Radio 5 Live and Radio 5 Sports Extra, BBC Sounds.
Barbara Slater, Director of BBC Sport, says:
“We have shown every Women’s World Cup on the BBC since 1999 and we are happy to extend our partnership with FIFA for the upcoming tournament. The growth of the women’s game is extraordinary, demonstrated by the 28 million who watched BBC coverage of the 2019 Women’s World Cup and the huge audience of 17.4 million who watched our coverage of the Euro 2022 final on TV last summer. In partnership with ITV we are delighted to make this World Cup available to the widest possible audience and free to air.”
Niall Sloane, ITV Director of Sport, says:
“We’re delighted to be able to bring comprehensive coverage of the Women’s World Cup, free to air to our audiences with both live and highlights broadcasts across ITV and ITVX. This tournament promises to provide memorable moments with the popularity of women’s football continuing to grow. England’s Lionesses are entering the World Cup Finals as European champions and fans have been able to follow their progress to qualification on ITV through our coverage of the World Cup qualifiers, so we hope they’ll join us to see all the action from Australia and New Zealand throughout the tournament.”
List of territories in which EBU Members will broadcast the FIFA Women’s World Cup Australia & New Zealand 2023: Albania, Austria, Belgium, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czechia, Estonia, France, Georgia, Germany, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland (Republic of), Italy, Kosovo, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Moldova, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, United Kingdom.
Marc Thornham