Uefa to end longstanding Team pact as Relevent enters exclusive ...

• Team has sold the commercial rights to the Champions League since tournament’s inception, delivering more than €50 billion
• Relevent in exclusive talks to secure global commercial rights to Uefa men’s club competitions for 2027-33 cycle following open tender
• Process expected to be concluded ‘in coming weeks’

Uefa looks set to end its longstanding relationship with the Team Marketing agency after announcing that it has entered into an exclusive period of negotiation with US-based Relevant Sports over the global commercial rights to its men’s club competitions. 

If those talks are successful, the deal would see Relevent sell the commercial rights to the Uefa Champions League, Europa League and Conference League on a global basis for the 2027 to 2033 cycle, a role that has largely been fulfilled by Team for more than three decades.

A statement issued on behalf of UC3, the joint venture between Uefa and the European Club Association (ECA), said that the decision to enter exclusive talks with Relevent followed ‘an open tender process’ launched last summer, which resulted in bids from ‘a number of global and regional agencies’. The process is expected to conclude ‘in the coming weeks’.

The news will come as a significant blow to Team, which was established alongside the modern Champions League in 1991 to sell the commercial rights to Uefa’s premier club competition and played a central role in developing the identity of the tournament.

According to The Independent, Uefa’s decision resulted in a state of shock at Team, as well as some anger about the process. 

Shortly after the announcement, Switzerland-based Team published a statement of its own, confirming that it had been informed of Uefa’s decision to enter exclusive negotiations with Relevent.

‘Naturally, we are disappointed, but we remain incredibly proud of the work we have done alongside Uefa over the past 35 years,’ the statement read.

‘Together, we have built a world-class commercial programme that has delivered over €50 billion in revenue for European club football, growing the value of the UMCCs (Uefa men’s club competitions) with each successive cycle. Even in the most challenging market conditions, we have always driven growth and consistently outperformed the market — including a more than 20 per cent increase in the current rights cycle.

‘Our success has always been built on the expertise, dedication, and innovation of our people. We believe we have the best team in the business — professionals who have demonstrated time and again their ability to create and deliver industry-leading commercial programmes. Now, we will evaluate what comes next for Team.

‘While this marks the end of an era, it is not the end of our ambition. Our deep knowledge of European club football, our track record of success, and our unwavering commitment to excellence remain. We are excited about the future and confident in Team’s expertise.

‘We want to take this opportunity to thank Uefa for the strong partnership and to restate our commitment to delivering the remainder of the 2024-27 cycle. We wish UC3 every success in the future.’

Team’s exclusive grip on Uefa’s club competitions loosened in 2022, when European soccer’s governing body awarded the US media rights sales contract for the ongoing 2024 to 2027 cycle to Relevent, which is controlled by Miami Dolphins owner Stephen Ross.

The agency proceeded to secure a US$1.5 billion, six-year broadcast deal with Paramount for the Champions League to remain on CBS, which also shows the Europa League and Conference League. 

Even that marked a departure from the norm for Uefa, which had previously extended with Team as opposed to putting the rights up for tender.

At the end of that process, Team did retain the commercial rights for the rest of the world, though it was reported at the time that it had agreed to cut its commission to do so.

On the back of that, Team sought to scale back its reliance on its relationship with Uefa and in 2024 struck a partnership with the International Basketball Federation (Fiba) to sell the commercial rights to the Basketball Champions League (BCL) and the Intercontinental Cup. 

The company also established a new agency called T/Squared to house its new business activities, which has since gone on to broker deals on behalf of the Davis Cup and Billie Jean King Cup national team tennis tournaments.

Uefa’s decision to work with Relevent will once again fuel speculation over Champions League games being played in the US. The agency, which is the architect of the International Champions Cup (ICC) preseason competition, has previously pushed to bring fixtures from overseas leagues to America.

Meanwhile Aleksander Ceferin, the president of Uefa, said in 2023 that it was “possible” for competitive Champions League games to be played in the US in the future.