Channel 4 wins rights to show England men’s football live until 2024

Channel 4 has secured the rights to show England matches for the next two years. Uefa Nations League games, qualifiers for Euro 2024 and friendlies will shown by the channel, which has taken over as broadcast partner from ITV and Sky.

Kicking off the deal will be June’s Nations League fixtures, with home and away encounters against Hungary and matches against Italy and Germany. European qualification begins next spring, with the draw for qualifying groups taking place in October. Channel 4 is scheduled to show 20 England matches in the period to 2024.

With the World Cup live on BBC and ITV in November and December, Channel 4’s deal means that all of the men’s national team fixtures will be live on free-to-air TV until 2024.

It follows a successful sporting year for Channel 4, which acquired one-off rights to show Emma Raducanu’s US Open final triumph and the climax to the Formula One season in Abu Dhabi and attracted 20m viewers to its coverage of the Tokyo Paralympic Games. The news comes after the government confirmed its intention to privatise the public service broadcaster.

Channel 4’s chief content officer, Ian Katz, said:“This deal shows Channel 4 can compete for some of the biggest properties in sport and will bring substantial new audiences to our award-winning slate of original programming.”