Digitaltveurope.com

Middle Eastern broadcaster Al Jazeera is launching a digital streaming sports service.

The company will air over 13,000 live events per year on the Aljazeerasport.tv site, which will include content across all of its Al Jazeera Sports TV channels as well as its entire comprehensive rights portfolio.

The service, which will launch online as well as an iPad application will launch across the Middle East and North Africa and marks the eight anniversary of Al Jazeera Sports. It will be free for the first month and US$10 (€7.20) per month after that.

Al Jazeera Sports has rights to sporting events including the FIFA World Cup, UEFA Euro 2012, UEFA Champions League as well as soccer leagues in Italy, Spain and the UK and US basketball league NBA and tennis tournament ATP.

Nasser bin Ghanem al-Khelaifi, general nanager of Al Jazeera Sport, said: “Al Jazeera Sport has built the most extensive set of sports channels in the world and we are pleased to take our service to another level with the launch of Aljazeerasport.tv. Digital is expanding rapidly across the MENA region and throughout the world and these platforms will allow sports fans to watch every match we own, whenever and wherever they want. We are delighted to make these services available on a free basis for the first month to celebrate the birthday of Al Jazeera Sport.”