Reports | PCB received formal apology from media rights partner over Bet365 row

Controversy broke out last month when it came to the light of the public that ITW, the media partner of PCB, sold the streaming rights of the 2020 edition of the Pakistan Super League (PSL) to Bet365, a British online gambling company. The PCB came under fire from many for allowing its premier T20 competition to be streamed on a betting site and were left red-faced as its believed that ITW sold the rights off to Bet365 without the knowledge of the board. 

While some believe that the PCB were unaware of the matches being streamed on Bet365, a source close to the board revealed that the board knew the happenings right from the word go, when the first match was streamed on February 20. The source further added that the media partner wrote a formal apology to PCB, within three to four days of the commencement of the league.

"The fact is that PCB became aware that the PSL matches were being live-streamed by Bet 365 on its website as soon as the league started on 20th February," a source close to PCB told TOI.

"Later on, the media rights partner also sent an email to the PCB apologising for their mistake and admitted they were at fault in the entire issue."

The source further revealed that the PCB asked Bet365 to stop streaming the matches after explaining them the reason and threatened to take legal action against the company if they did not stop showing games live. Bet365 are believed to have stopped the streaming of matches from March 3. 

"The PCB informed the betting company that it was given live streaming rights without its (PCB's) knowledge which was a must under the contract they had with their media rights partner.”

Cricket FootBall Kabaddi

Basketball Hockey

SportsCafe