Premier League TV Rights: North Korea and the hour of the censors...

Premier League TV rights are in demand worldwide. To put it in numbers: in 152 countries, the events from the world's strongest league are broadcast on screens. Even North Korea has jumped on the Premier League TV bandwagon. With some conditions that make the questionable broadcast from the gray zone seem even more bizarre than it already is. 

And now for something completely different... North Korea seems to have developed a taste for it. The Champions League hit Real Madrid against Manchester City (3:1) was aired on state television KCTV – free and without charge.

It was announced as a "special service for the people" and shown live, although probably no ordinary North Korean citizen is allowed to book a Football Trip Champions League. 

The Premier League TV rights will bring up to 8 billion euros to the 20 clubs according to the latest Premier League TV deal starting in the 2025/2026 season. The current live broadcast guarantees 6 billion euros in the Premier League TV deal. 

In Germany and Austria, the Premier League TV rights are with the Munich-based pay-TV broadcaster Sky until the 2027/2028 season. TNT Sports and Sky Sports UK share the broadcasting rights in the UK. 

Without Premier League TV deal: "The best league in the world for free" 

Now let's turn to the core problem of the Premier League propaganda show in North Korea. According to British media reports, there is no Premier League TV deal between North Korea and the makers of News Corp. 

Why would there be? "We want to give the people the opportunity to watch one of the best leagues in the world for free," says North Korea's dictator Kim Jong-un.

Free is nice... The games are sometimes broadcast with several months of delay. As reported by the British newspaper The Guardian, the TV broadcast of the Premier League in North Korea started on January 13, 2025, with the match Ipswich Town against FC Liverpool (0:2) and the league debut for LFC Coach Arne Slot. 

However, this match had already taken place 150 days earlier, in August. Okay, not quite up to speed…

From the 2023/2024 season, 21 games made it into North Korean living rooms.

Of course, not live, but only in edited highlights, lasting a maximum of 60 minutes and having gone through the editing computer several times.

“The broadcast is, of course, a violation of copyright,” explains Justin McCurry, Tokyo correspondent for the Guardian in February 2025. “North Korea has no broadcasting rights to show the Premier League.”

McCurry continues: “Live-action or Gary Lineker presenting in his underwear (following a lost betting wager on Leicester City 2016, ed.), you can’t expect that…”

What else can one expect? North Korean state television KCTV mostly shows war films, where there is, of course, only one winner, and endless propaganda for the Kim dynasty, which has been in power since 1948.

Premier League TV in North Korea: Six months later… 

Six months after the start of the 2024/2025 season, the Premier League is now being broadcast according to the tastes of the North Korean authorities.

“That Kim has demonized the West for years could not prevent him from installing one of the top European leagues regularly on North Korean TV,” says Justin McCurry, “in a football-obsessed country that has made its mark in international competitions.” 

Ask Italy – The "Squadra Azzurra" experienced one of the greatest shock defeats in World Cup history at the 1966 World Cup in England with their elimination against North Korea (0:1) in Middlesbrough, with a goal by Pak Doo-ik, a military doctor by profession.

Premier League in North Korea – it's a feast for Western satirists and obviously hard work for the "censorship" department in Pyongyang.

Each Premier League game is edited before being broadcast, including the modification of all displayed English-language graphics. All text elements in the stadium are overlaid with North Korean translations.

“Kim Jong-un,” reports the Vienna Kronen-Zeitung (edition of March 2, 2025), “has strict conditions that must be met to view moving images of Salah and Co.”

These conditions leave one shaking their head as a long-time observer.

The diversity that is practiced in the Premier League and other leagues does not exist in North Korea. All symbols that indicate equality and diversity, such as rainbow-colored armbands or corner flags, are rigorously removed from the broadcasts.

Premier League Stars from South Korea: Son is not present in this match…

Last but not least: The three Premier League professionals from the "class enemy" South Korea are completely cut from the game by Pyongyang.

These are, in the 2024/2025 season, former HSV and Leverkusen player Heung-min Son from Tottenham Hotspur, Hee-chan Hwang from Wolverhampton Wanderers, and Kim Ji-soo from FC Brentford, whose home country South Korea has been declared by Kim as "the number one enemy of the state." 

At least for the matches selected this season: One will have to imagine the course of the game…

15 goal contributions by Heung-min Son in 24 appearances for the "Spurs" will have to be cut out, just like the two goals by Hwang for the "Wolves".

Kim Ji-soo was only used twice for Brentford.

The names of the South Koreans and graphics, such as performance data of these players, will be cut out as usual, without any humor.

Or in other words: Son does not appear in this match…

This last happened in England in 1975 and in the Monty Python film Monty Python and the Holy Grail with the famous "Sir-does-not-appear-in-this-film."