Sky New Zealand (Sky NZ) has announced it has agreed to a new six-year broadcast deal for the rights of the English Premier League from the 2022-23 season.

The new partnership sees Sky NZ take the broadcast rights previously held by Spark Sport, after Sky NZ recently held the rights until 2018 before Spark won the rights.

Sky NZ will show all 380 Premier League season games live and on-demand on its pay-tv channels and on the Sky Sport Now platform.

Discussing the return of Premier League football to the broadcaster, Sky CEO, Sophie Moloney, said: “Securing the content that matters most to our customers is a key part of our strategy.”

“Our customers know that there is always great sport to watch on Sky, every month of the year, with the best of New Zealand and global competition.

“Those of our Sky Sport customers who are fanatical football fans have had to purchase a second service to watch the Premier League in recent years, and it’s great to now be able to offer them the Premier League as part of their wide range of sport and entertainment viewing options on Sky,” Moloney said.

The partnership will likely see Spark Sport forced to reduce its subscription prices for viewers according to Stuff, after Spark Sport head, Jeff Latch, said Spark was “naturally disappointed” after losing the broadcast rights.

Despite the loss of the Premier League, Spark still holds the broadcast rights to the UEFA Champions League, UEFA Europa League, and UEFA Conference League.

“We both win and lose content rights as they come to market,” Latch said.

“Over the past few months we have secured a range of rights including extended NFL action, UFC, FIBA, the United Rugby Championship and Diamond League World Athletics.

“Our focus remains on delivering a great customer experience, growing our subscriber base, and identifying strategic partnership opportunities to further grow and scale our business…

“We have always said we will invest in content through the dual lens of customer desirability and commercial returns, and unfortunately in this instance what staked up for us wasn’t the winning bid at the end of the day,” he said.