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eports have emerged UEFA is searching for a new Australian broadcast partner for the UEFA Champions League after a $60 million partnership with Sports Flick could fail.

The report from the Sydney Morning Herald suggests streaming service, Sports Flick, which beat out competitors such as Optus Sport, Stan and Kayo for the rights, has failed to get financial guarantees from a bank.

The report cited anonymous sources and revealed UEFA has started contacting rival bidders to re-engage broadcast partnership discussions over the rights to the international club-based football competition.

“[UEFA requires] a significant number of extra checks and balances,” the source said, discussing the potential for the deal to fail.

“Being a startup, there are significant complexities and challenges which have prolonged the process, and are not as straightforward as the public would expect,” the source said.

Sports Flick, since its creation by Sydney man, Dylan Azzopardi, has held broadcast rights to a number of minor competitions including Nicaraguan football and Indian baseball, but has been attempting to challenge the football broadcast rights market after winning the rights to broadcast South Korea’s K-League.

The company was viewed as a challenger for Optus Sport, who had previously held the exclusive Australian broadcast rights to both the UEFA Champions League and the K-League before the Sports Flick deals.

Recently, Optus Sport secured the rights to the South American football championship, the Copa America.

Elsewhere, FIFA has announced the opening of two invitations to tender (ITT) for the broadcast rights to the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup in Australia and New Zealand.

Optus Sport shared the broadcast rights to the 2019 edition with SBS, but there are reports Stan, Kayo, Sports Flick and Amazon Prime Sport, which recently began broadcast partnerships in Australia, could all compete for the rights.