{"id":594687,"date":"2026-08-24T18:02:10","date_gmt":"2026-08-24T18:02:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/594687\/"},"modified":"2026-08-24T18:02:10","modified_gmt":"2026-08-24T18:02:10","slug":"efl-and-scottish-league-pushing-to-stop-illegal-broadcast-of-matches-in-russia-soccer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/594687\/","title":{"rendered":"EFL and Scottish league pushing to stop illegal broadcast of matches in Russia | Soccer"},"content":{"rendered":"

The English Football League<\/a> and Scottish Professional Football League have launched investigations and are considering legal action after discovering that television coverage of their matches has been broadcast in Russia this season.<\/p>\n

Football TV, a Russian subscription and streaming service, has broadcast numerous games from the opening two rounds of the EFL, as well as Scottish Premiership<\/a> matches featuring Celtic, Rangers and Hearts.<\/p>\n

The EFL and SPFL stopped broadcasting in Russia in March 2022 after the previous month\u2019s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, and have not sold rights packages in the country since, so the live footage of games appears to have been obtained and televised illegally.<\/p>\n

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Until Russia\u2019s full-scale invasion the EFL had a rights contract with Football TV, and the Scottish Premiership was broadcast on Match TV.<\/p>\n

The Premier League suspended its broadcasts in Russia at the same time, with its rights held by Okko Sport.<\/p>\n

The EFL contacted Football TV last week after being alerted that several games, including Cardiff\u2019s 1-1 draw with Wrexham<\/a> last Monday and Watford\u2019s 2-1 win over Southampton<\/a> the previous day, were shown in Russia, but despite this complaint the broadcaster also aired live coverage of West Ham v Charlton<\/a> and West Brom v Burnley<\/a> this past weekend.<\/p>\n

Those matches were listed as test events, raising concerns that Football TV may also plan to show illegal content from the Premier League.<\/p>\n

Several Scottish Premiership matches were shown over the past two weekends, with the broadcasts promoted on Football TV\u2019s Telegram channel.<\/p>\n

The EFL and the SPFL\u2019s priority is to ensure the broadcasts stop, which is being pursued, and they are seeking to discover the source of the pirated content.<\/p>\n

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Both organisations are understood to reserve the right to take legal action against Football TV and whoever is supplying it with access to their matches.<\/p>\n

An SPFL source said the league was investigating the matter in conjunction with its broadcasting distribution rights holder, Infront.<\/p>\n

The EFL and SPFL declined to comment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The English Football League and Scottish Professional Football League have launched investigations and are considering legal action after…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":594688,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[85,46,105],"class_list":["post-594687","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/594687","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=594687"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/594687\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/594688"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=594687"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=594687"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=594687"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}