“It’s no mystery that we’re interested in expanding our portfolio,” Executive Vice President and General Manager at CBS Sports Digital Jeffrey Gerttula told World Soccer Talk. “We certainly love the soccer space, and we’re looking in a lot of places, but we have to find the right partners.
“Soccer is important to us. We love the audience. [They’re] passionate and youthful. We’ve already seen the power of it with the Champions League audience. It’s a core piece of Paramount+.”
A source says that CBS Sports is in talks of acquiring rights to Serie A League for the 2021/22 through 2023/24 seasons.
ESPN+ currently has the rights but it expires in the 2020/21 season. They are trying to renew their rights but face bidding competition with CBS Sports. The decision will come in a few weeks.
“Our skill set [at Paramount+] is live sports,” Gerttula explained. “A lot of the competitors — not all of them, but most of them — [have] live sports as a key piece of the portfolio. Not only [do we have] UEFA Champions League, but all of our ‘blue chip’ rights around [American] football, golf, and college basketball are all in there [on Paramount+]. We already have a huge sports audience within CBS All Access, and that audience will be in Paramount+. And that’s why soccer is such an interesting fit for us. It continues to build off that live sports interest.”
Sources: World Soccer Talk