WSC Sports equips broadcasters with automation tools to generate personalised, AI-powered video content instantly.
The 2024/25 English Premier League season delivered much more than headline results. It accelerated a shift in how football content is created, distributed, and experienced, and broadcasters across the Middle East and North Africa are not exempt from its repercussions.
New Storylines, Expanding the Scope of Engagement
Liverpool’s resurgence under Arne Slot, marked by commanding performances like the 5-1 win over Tottenham, generated high-interest coverage with global reach. At the same time, clubs such as Aston Villa, Nottingham Forest, and Bournemouth introduced competitive and culturally distinct narratives that expanded the editorial range for rights holders. This broadening of compelling content requires broadcasters to think beyond legacy formats and present-day hierarchies when planning coverage.
The Business Gap and the Response It Demands
Leicester, Ipswich and Southampton were relegated in their first season back – an outcome that highlights the widening gap between elite clubs and the rest of the league. This imbalance concentrates attention and value around a small group of teams than in previous years, making it harder for broadcasters to extract consistent engagement across the full season and a more holistic broadcast schedule. For MENA rights holders, this reinforces the importance of content strategies that go beyond live matches. Behind-the-scenes access, club-level narratives, and long-range storytelling can help create relevance and differentiation even when competitive drama is uneven.
Digital Media: From Add-On to Core
The EPL’s evolving media strategy reinforces the global shift toward digital-first delivery. Sky and TNT securing domestic rights again, alongside the league’s planned in-house content operation from 2026/27, illustrates the direction: leagues will produce more content directly, and digital workflows will be foundational. MENA broadcasters must treat mobile platforms, short-form video, and personalised content delivery as central to their offering – not extensions of traditional broadcast.
Platform-Specific, Culturally Aware Distribution
Short-form content continues to gain traction with younger viewers (and other demographics, too), and MENA audiences are no exception. TikTok, Instagram, YouTube and X offer wide reach – but success on these platforms requires intentional design. Each one supports different formats, behaviors, and attention spans. Broadcasters in the region need digital strategies that reflect these nuances, using content that is localized and responsive to platform-specific trends.
Infrastructure, Commerce, and Content Are Now Interlinked
Manchester United’s planned 100,000-seat stadium is part of a broader shift toward multi-purpose sports venues, which should help accelerate global commercial expansion in a reality where business models must rely on multifaceted operations and diversified revenue streams that work together.
For MENA broadcasters, these developments open up new models of partnership: branded content integrations, sponsorship activations embedded in coverage, and hybrid experiences across screens and venues. Understanding where commercial infrastructure intersects with media output will be essential to maintaining relevance.
Next Steps for MENA Broadcasters
The 2024/25 season reinforced the need for the ability to create content quickly, master digital platforms, and tell stories that resonate with specific audiences (the trinity of content agility, digital fluency, and contextual storytelling).
Turning those imperatives into action requires ambition, alongside strategic operational shifts, scalable infrastructure, and clear editorial intent.
This means focusing on practical steps such as:
- Prioritise multi-format, real-time video creation
As one sports media executive put it at a recent industry event hosted by WSC Sports, You can’t serve TikTok and YouTube Shorts with the same exact clip. Format specificity is the new standard. MENA broadcasters must build workflows that generate multiple outputs from the same source content – vertical, horizontal, short-form, long-form – all within tight timeframes. This demands not just skilled editors, but technology that can automate versioning, tagging, and distribution. - Localise with cultural and platform sensitivity
According to another key takeaway from a different WSC Sports meetup held in Athens, Localisation is no longer just language – it’s cultural relevance, platform rhythm, and timing. Success on TikTok looks very different than on Instagram Stories or YouTube, and each MENA sub-region has distinct trends and audience behaviors. Winning broadcasters are those who tailor content strategy at the intersection of culture, platform, and moment. - Rethink storytelling beyond matchdays
As competition intensifies and matchday narratives become more concentrated around top-tier clubs, there’s growing value in creating editorial content that extends beyond the pitch. Player profiles, behind-the-scenes mini-docs, and data-driven highlight formats can help balance schedule gaps and drive engagement throughout the week, not just around marquee matchdays.
Other actionable insights include “build for Scale without losing identity” and “anchoring content to commercial objectives”. As noted in the Premier League’s evolving stadium and sponsorship strategies, content, commerce, and infrastructure are becoming deeply interconnected. MENA broadcasters should look into doubling down on sponsorship models baked into content, such as branded highlight packs, co-produced interview series, or interactive ad units that bridge digital and venue experiences.
WSC Sports: A Strategic Content Engine
WSC Sports equips broadcasters with automation tools to generate personalised, AI-powered video content instantly. The platform supports localised storytelling at scale, making it easier to meet digital audience expectations while maintaining editorial control. As broadcasters in the region plan for the next cycle, solutions like WSC Sports can provide the scale and flexibility needed to compete in a landscape where fast content creation and wide distribution are now basic requirements.