Market competition finally drove Bundesliga domestic TV rights through the roof

Since the collapse of the Kirch media empire at the start of the 21st century, the television rights for German football have been relatively paltry. While the Premier League and Liga BBVA (La Liga) have seen massive gains in the last decade, the German top flight has lagged behind. That paradigm has been shifted with the release of the Bundesliga's new domestic television deal today.

Here are the main highlights:

• Annual domestic television and media revenue will rise, topping €1.2B per season.
• International television and media revenue will add an additional €200-300M per season, a total increase of 85% over the previous media deal
• The domestic allocation scheme -- ie the division of TV and media revenue based on league and league position finish-- has yet to be determined
• Bundesliga matches will now be spread across four days with both Friday and Monday matches in addition to the Saturday and Sunday blocks.
• Complete 2. Bundesliga coverage

The main driver of this is change seems to be the entrance of another party into the race. For year's Sky Sport has been the sole arbiter of pay-TV sport in Germany but Eurosport jumped into the game this year and this is the result. It lends significant credence to the idea that the appetite for German football is there, all that was missing was the sports infrastructure to capitalize on it.

On the flip side, as exciting as this new is for many Bundesliga sides who might finally have the financial wherewithal to compete with the financial giants there is a dark cloud on the horizon. The Bundesliga will approach the Premier League for just a single season though as the English league's annual media revenue explodes next season. It will rise to top €5B.