The Football Federation Australia (FFA) has confirmed it is in discussions with national broadcaster Network Ten around a deal that would reportedly put more A-League soccer matches on free-to-air (FTA) television.

According to the Sydney Morning Herald, the network is preparing a major bid for Australian soccer’s top-flight FTA rights in a move that could pre-empt a later challenge to dethrone Fox Sports as the A-League’s principle broadcaster.

As it stands, Fox carries the broadcast rights to the A-League until the end of the 2022/23 campaign, though Herald sources claim that Ten wants to expand the number of games it shows a week when the league’s FTA rights become available next season.

Quoted by the Herald, FFA chief executive David Gallop said: "We are in discussions with Ten but it’s not appropriate to go into the details at this point. We need to protect the substantial investment that Fox Sports have made in the A-League while recognising that FTA coverage opens the game to more eyeballs."

The FFA deal with Fox Sports, which was agreed in December 2016, includes a provision for one A-League match to be televised via FTA per week, and is currently broadcast via Ten’s streaming channel, One, as part of a carriage deal with Fox.

If a deal is engineered, the move could prove a massive coup for Ten, which lost broadcast rights to the Big Bash League (BBL), Australia’s annual Twenty20 franchise cricket tournament, to Fox Sports and Channel Seven last year.

However, with A-League teams ready to assume ownership of the competition from the FFA ahead of the 2019/20 instalment, Fox apparently remains the preferred choice of broadcaster among the league’s clubs and is prepared to put up AUD$57.6 million (US$41 million) a year to remain the competition’s rights holder. In addition, if a new arrangement around the A-League’s FTA rights is agreed Fox would reportedly retain all advertising revenue from Ten’s coverage.

Elsewhere, Ten has secured live FTA rights to Wallabies matches during this year’s 2019 Rugby World Cup in Japan – alongside Fox Sports – and also broadcasts Super Rugby and Formula One highlights.