The Association of Basketball Clubs (ACB) has reached an agreement with ESPN, the television platform owned by Disney, to acquire the television rights of the competitions organized by the ACB, Endesa League, Copa del Rey and Endesa Super Cup, starting this season 2021-22 to 2023-24 in 24 countries and territories in Latin America. The agreement includes issuance in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, French Guiana, Guyana, Paraguay, Peru, Suriname, Uruguay, Venezuela, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Panama, Belize and other territories.
Comprehensive coverage throughout Latin America is “one more step in the commitment to international expansion and development” of the ACB, the employers’ association said in a statement, whose competitions can already be followed on television in 141 countries in America, Europe, Africa and Asia . The rights acquired by ESPN include the live broadcast of all the matches of the three championships, as well as additional content for all ACB fans, including weekly programs such as El Quinto Cuarto for distribution on linear and digital TV through the platform Star+.
The ACB competitions have a representation of more than twenty Latin American players in the 2021-22 season. In 2019, 9 of the 12 Argentine players who were proclaimed runners-up in the world had played in the Spanish league. The general director of the ACB, José Miguel Calleja, stressed that for various historical and cultural reasons the Spanish League “maintains a strong link with Latin American basketball.” “It occupies a priority place within our internationalization objectives. This agreement with ESPN provides us with optimal broadcasting throughout the region, with the quality guarantee provided by the leading sports television platform in the subcontinent and the possibility of developing a project in the medium and long term”, he assessed.
