La Liga will now be broadcast by Facebook in India
Social media giant Facebook has bought the exclusive rights to broadcast La Liga matches in the Indian sub-continent. This strategy would help the company to increase the time spent on the platform. It will live stream the matches for the next three seasons, starting 2018-19. With this, one would be able to watch these matches on Facebook, at zero cost, in Indian sub-continent.
When did Facebook begin venturing into sports streaming?
Facebook began venturing into sports streaming by broadcasting weekly Major League Basketball matches. Earlier this month, the social media giant had reached an agreement with Eleven Sports to broadcast one La Liga and one Serie A match per week on its platform. This month, the Italian match will see the football superstar Cristiano Ronaldo make his first Serie A appearance for Juventus.
Reasons behind choosing the Indian subcontinent
La Liga has been looking to expand its audience base in India. Notably, it had also opened an office in New Delhi in September 2016. The deal will be fruitful for both parties as La Liga had noticed a rise of 2.2 million users, last year, on its social media channels in the Indian sub-continent. Facebook has 348 million users in the Indian sub-continent.
Comments from La Liga officials
The head of La Liga's digital strategy, Alfredo Bermejo told Reuters, "One of our goals for the last two years has been to offer content to the widest audience possible, so partnering with free platforms like Facebook is key to us."
Comments from Facebook officials
Peter Hutton, Facebook's Director of Global Live Sports, said that Facebook will not rush to take broadcasting rights everywhere and will gather data and analyze their possibility of expansion. He further added that Facebook's monitoring system will prevent users from anywhere else in the world, other than in the Indian subcontinent, to stream the matches on the social media platform.
Where can fans watch the matches?
Fans can go to the official La Liga Facebook page or the pages of the clubs in action to stream the matches without any subscription cost.
