Wales' three huge summer rugby matches go completely behind paywall with no S4C live coverage allowed

Wales' three summer rugby Tests against South Africa will only be shown on Sky Sports, with no live Welsh language coverage on S4C.

Sky Sports confirmed the news on Tuesday after winning the rights to all the series involving the home nations back in March. It had been hoped S4C would be able to provide their own Welsh language-only coverage after talks were held in recent weeks. A highlights package remains a possibility.

S4C have been able to show Wales football matches in Welsh in recent years, despite Sky Sports' "exclusive" UK rights in English, but no such situation exists for the rugby.

It means Wales matches will be entirely behind a paywall, with no live Welsh language provision. In the past couple of years, Amazon Prime Video have shown Wales' autumn rugby matches. In 2020 they struck a deal with S4C to broadcast the games in Welsh before ditching that last year and offering their own Welsh language coverage instead.

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The news comes days after Sky Sports revealed they have agreed a deal for Wales' football World Cup play-off final match on Sunday to be shown on ITV, as well as S4C.

Sky Sports will show every UK home rugby nation's summer tour matches in the southern hemisphere as part of a new broadcast deal with SANZAAR. England take on Australia in July, while Scotland have three matches in Argentina. Ireland play a three-Test series in New Zealand.

Wales play world champions South Africa on July 2, July 9 and July 16. The first Test against the Springboks will be held at Loftus Versfeld in Pretoria. From there Wayne Pivac’s squad will head to the Toyota Stadium in Bloemfontein, before completing the series at DHL