Setanta secures exclusive broadcast deal w Top Rank (merged)

[Asterix]

Setanta secures exclusive broadcast deal with Top Rank And Saurland Promotions

Setanta Sports has today cemented its position as the home of boxing by securing a three-year deal with US boxing promoters Top Rank, Inc. and a two-year deal with European promoters Sauerland Events. The deals, which run from January 2009, will showcase world title bouts featuring some of the best fighters on the planet, including Manny Pacquiao, Antonio Margarito, Kelly Pavlik, Alexander Povetkin and Nikolai Valuev. All fights will be exclusively live on Setanta Sports in the UK and Ireland.

The first fight of the Top Rank deal sees Antonio Margarito defending his world welterweight title against the dangerous Shane Mosley on Saturday, January 24th, 2009. This world title bout will be followed with a world class ‘one-two’ as both Kelly Pavlik and Miguel Cotto take to the ring against unconfirmed opponents on Saturday, February 21st, 2009. The deal will see two Top Rank promoted events featuring on the channel every month for the duration of the deal.

As an addition to the deal with Top Rank, Inc., Setanta has also signed a deal with European based Sauerland Events to broadcast one exclusively live bout a month featuring one of their stable. The fights to be shown on Setanta will include Alexander Povetkin’s heavyweight world title challenge against Wladimir Klitschko and world title defences from ‘King’ Arthur Abraham and Nikolai Valuev.

Setanta Sports’ Sean O’Hara, commented: “This is another fantastic deal for Setanta and proves that we really are ‘the home of boxing’. We are committed to bringing the best fights to our subscribers and by signing this three-year deal with Top Rank, viewers will be treated to world-class bouts involving Manny Pacquiao, Antonio Margarito and Miguel Cotto amongst others. This is in addition to a new deal with Sauerland we are announcing today and our exclusive broadcasts of bouts involving the best of British stars such as Joe Calzaghe and David Haye.”

President of Top Rank, Inc., Todd DuBoef, added: “This is a fantastic opportunity for Top Rank and we are really pleased to have signed this great deal that will bring some of the best boxers in the world to UK screens. Setanta have proven beyond any doubt that they are committed to boxing across the globe. We have worked well in the past, so it was a no-brainer to continue the relationship for another three years.”
Sauerland’s Head of Events, Kalle Sauerland, commented: “We are delighted to have signed this deal with Setanta and look forward to working with them over the next two years. We have an exciting stable of fighters at Sauerland, including two world champion fighters and one mandatory world title challenger and we’re sure British fight fans will be pleased they can now catch these fights exclusively live on Setanta.”

[Autobarn]

Great news. I like Top Rank and I like Sauerland shows. Great that we'll have some German stuff, and it broadens our viewing a bit.

[Dioufy]

Eff yeah!

I was petrified Margarita/Mosley was going to be on a PPV of some sorts, and the Saulerland deal is just a massive bonus.

[adwatson]

great to know that we are going to be getting top quality american and european boxing for the near future.

Top rank always have a good stable so should be in for some good shows

[exittored]

ROCKING GOOD NEWS

[Datsue]

Isn't Pavlik with Arum & Abraham with Sauerland?

Could be coolio.

[Poncey]

I just peed myself with joy. No Cotto PPV. Yay!

Take THAT Sky!

[REAL_DEAL]

Good news i hope it doesn't rain on them days

[Poncey]

Holy shit! We get Arce v Darchinyan now.

[stujones]

Fan bloody tastic.

All we need now is for Sky / ITV to follow the lead, maybe for ITV to secure LIVE rights for Brian Peters bills - or maybe showcase Versus/ESPN/Showtime bills in the states.

[DavidPayne]

Setanta is the new alliance, leave the dark side behind.

[My T Sharp]

This is great news!!!

However I reckon Pac Vs hatton would be on Sky PPV, I don't think Arum would let Setanta have that one.

[BAMBI]

good one buncey u bloody monkey!! D

[leforge]

The Hatton fight would be in UK so it be promoted by Hatton so box office.

[Bentley23]

thats awsome

[Chambers2]

"I say we love Se-Tan-Ta,
I say we love Se-Tan-Ta.
I say we love Se-Tan-Ta
I say we love Se-Tan-Ta"

[leforge]

I wonder if Sky will do deal with Golden boy, more boxing the better!!

[Phenomenal-Nutrition]

Hopefully they also get some fights from Golden Boy

[fluxstuff]

Three year deal with Top Rank, two years with Sauerland. I love these guys - everytime I think I might cancel, they do something like this and rescue my faith. Between this and iTV's deal with Hennessey Sports, I think boxing is coming back in a seriously big way in the UK.

[My T Sharp]

If Setanta went after a British promoter, would they have any options? Or do all the big promoters have deals already?

[fluxstuff]

Considering they're suing the bollocks off of Warren right now, probably not.

[Twinkle Toes]

It would be very good for us, if they could snaffle up exclusive contracts with all the big Yank promoters.

This leaves no where for SN and SKY to go when they want to tag a Khan mismatch onto some Yank bill and charge us a PPV for it.

[black panther]

Great news, will be nice to see all the best of Top Rank. It was well annoying that Sky,having shown just about all of Miguel Cotto's fights from the point he was 13-0 decided to pull the plug once he reaches the elite level. Also top news that Sauerland bills will be on - hopefully live. Some German bills are real quality - top to bottom. But I hope they still turn up on Eurosport as well - they tend to show all the undercard fights on Eurosport as well.

[Asterix]

You can see Top Rank's fighters here: http://www.toprank.com/fighters (I had forgotten just how good of a stable they've got!)

You can see Sauerland's fighters here: http://www.boxen.com/themen/sauerland/boxer.php