The final of the Australian Open between Jannik Sinner and Daniil Medvedev, scheduled for tomorrow, January 28th at 9.30 Italian time, will not be broadcast free-to-air. Discovery, which holds the rights to the event, will broadcast the match on Eurosport, available in Italy on Sky and streaming on Discovery+, Now, Dazn, Tim Vision and Amazon Prime. Therefore, a subscription will be necessary to watch the match. Much to the disappointment of the millions of fans who would have liked to cheer for Sinner. But why won't the match be broadcast free-to-air?
Why won't Sinner-Medvedev be broadcast free-to-air?
There is an explanation: the Australian Open final is not included in the list of events of national interest drawn up by Agcom in 2012. For tennis, the list includes "the final and semifinals of the Davis Cup and Fed Cup in which the Italian national team participates and the Italian Tennis Internationals in which Italian athletes participate". These matches, as established by the Authority for Communications Guarantees, must be broadcast free-to-air. For others, there is no obligation. And so Sinner-Medvedev, in Italy, will be the exclusive privilege of subscribers to one of the aforementioned services.
Previous cases
However, in the past it has happened several times that a sporting event, even if not part of the Agcom list, was broadcast free-to-air, in light of its national relevance. This happened, for example, in 2015 when the all-Italian final between Flavia Pennetta and Roberta Vinci at the US Open was broadcast on Deejay Tv (the current Channel Nine). More recently, the 2021 Wimbledon final between Berrettini and Djokovic was broadcast by Sky free-to-air on TV8.
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