The Champions League's top matches could be aired on the likes of Amazon or Netflix as part of a new commercial deal aimed at raising £4.3bn a year.
UEFA will send out tenders for the bidding process for their competitions from 2027 onwards over the coming weeks.
And Daily Mail Sport understands that Relevent, the US firm brought in to sell the rights, wants to offer the first choice for each round of Champions League fixtures exclusively to a global streaming platform in an attempt to significantly boost revenues.
Such a move would see Amazon, Netflix or another successful bidder take the plum ties from the Champions League on a regular basis.
Netflix are keen to add major sporting events to their offerings, while Disney is also thought to be weighing up such a move. The hope is that the prospect triggers a bidding war among the planet’s big-hitters.
Currently, the gross revenue of all UEFA’s men’s competitions is around £3.84bn. In February, Relevent were brought in to become the worldwide marketing sales partner for UC3 – the joint venture between UEFA and the European Football Clubs (EFC).
They have been tasked with overseeing deals from 2027-28 to 2032-33. The move marked the end of UEFA’s 30-year relationship with TEAM Marketing, a Swiss-based agency credited with helping the Champions League become a global powerhouse.
A figure of £4.3bn would mark an uplift of around £460m and could well be good news for English clubs competing in Europe, given it would trigger an increase in their payments from UEFA’s pot.
Last year, Netflix screened Mike Tyson's fight with Jake Paul, while they have also struck agreements to broadcast key Major League Baseball and NFL games. They are yet to dip into season-long packages. In the US, Apple show MLS games.
The current deal sees TNT Sports hold the main rights in the UK, although Amazon do screen certain matches.
An intriguing situation was the talk of the rebranded EFC General Assembly, which kicked off today and saw around 800 execs head to Rome’s Waldorf Astoria Hotel for what is a two-day summit.
UEFA president Aleksander Ceferin referenced the new approach in a speech to delegates.
‘Together we are building something unique with ambition, to deliver the most engaging football, the most innovative and the most accessible to expand our core revenue streams,’ he said.
‘To inspire new fans to follow our competitions, to drive engagement with new audiences especially in an ever-changing media and streaming right landscape and to make the most of digital platforms and bring the game closer together for ever. This is how we will keep European football at the very top.’
Later, Gary Neville recorded his Overlap podcast in the main auditorium, along with regulars Roy Keane, Ian Wright, Jill Scott and Jamie Carragher and special guest Marcel Desailly.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the furore over his request for builders on one of his sites to take down the Union flag was not mentioned.