Canal+ tightens its grip on African football
Forty countries. That is the reach Canal+ just bought itself across sub-Saharan Africa. The French broadcaster confirmed on Tuesday it had signed exclusive, multilingual rights to Europe’s three men’s club competitions, and the agreement stretches all the way to 2031. No fee was disclosed.
Subscribers get the payoff from mid-2027. That is when Canal+ starts carrying the Champions League, the Europa League and the Conference League on an exclusive basis across the region.
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SuperSport and Canal+ Sport carve up the map
The continent splits along language lines. In English- and Portuguese-speaking Africa, SuperSport keeps the three competitions it has long carried. That is no longer a rival arrangement. SuperSport became a Canal+ subsidiary once the MultiChoice takeover went through.
French-speaking markets go the other way. Canal+ Sport channels will show every match in French and nowhere else, according to the statement from the group run by Maxime Saada.
Rugby was the warning shot
This was not a one-off. Back in June, Canal+ had already grabbed the African rights to the next two Rugby World Cups, the men’s tournament in 2027 and the women’s in 2029. Football is simply the bigger prize on the same shopping list.
The MultiChoice deal, wrapped up in September 2025, is what makes any of this possible. Canal+ now counts 40 million subscribers spread across more than 70 countries. Ten years ago that number was four times smaller.
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