With five weeks to go before the largest World Cup in history begins, football fans in China and India still don't know how they will be able to follow the event... of if they will be able to watch it at all, as FIFA still hasn't reached an agreement with any broadcasters in the two largest populated countries in the world.
Reuters reports that FIFA had asked for $100 million for the broadcast rights of the World Cups 2026 and 2030 in India, but a joint venture between Disney and Reliance, one of India's largest companies, only offered $20 million for 2026 World Cup, believing that World Cup 2026 will have lower viewership because the tournament takes place in North America and most matches will be past midnight in India.
China also doesn't have an official broadcaster for World Cup either, which is surprising given that 49.8% of all hours of viewing on digital and social platforms globally during the 2022 World Cup came from this country, as well as 17.7% of the global linear TV reach of the 2022 edition, held in Qatar. India accounted for the 2.9%. In 2018 and 2022, Chinese state broadcaster CCTV secured the rights months in advance, but not this time.
Despite being a very popular sport, China only qualified for the World Cup once, in 2002, and lost all matches. India has never qualified for World Cup.
World Cup 2026 will kick off on June 11, and FIFA has five weeks to find a broadcaster partner able to set up the broadcast infrastructure and sell the advertising inventory in time. "Discussions in China and India regarding the sale of media rights for the FIFA World Cup 2026 are ongoing and must remain confidential at this stage", FIFA responded to Reuters.