History
The channel was launched in 1999 as a pan-Scandinavian channel. It was launched to make use of the many sports rights in the MTG portfolio that weren't shown on TV3 and therefore were unused.
In January 2002, Viasat Sport Denmark (later replaced by TV 2 Sport) was launched and the original version would now target Sweden and Norway. This continued until SportN for Norway launched in 2005. When Viasat launched to new sports channels in 2004, Viasat Sport 2 and Viasat Sport 3, the first channel got the name "Viasat Sport 1".
In March 2008, Viasat received a licence to broadcast Viasat Sport 1 in the terrestrial network. As of August 2009, the terrestrial broadcasts were yet to begin since the infrastructure to broadcast the new channels hadn't been put in place.
On October 17, 2008, Viasat relaunched their sports channels in Sweden, Norway and Finland. This meant that Viasat Sport 1 reverted back to its old name Viasat Sport. Most soccer-related programmes were moved to Viasat Fotboll. Contact sports programmes that were formerly on Viasat Sport 3 was moved to Viasat Sport.
The launch of Viasat Hockey on September 1, 2009, meant that most hockey broadcasts were moved to a separate channel, including the Ice Hockey World Championships, HockeyAllsvenskan, the NHL and KHL. Sports remaining on Viasat Sport are tennis, basketball, American football and contact sports.
Viasat acquired the rights of football's English Premier League in April 2010 and announced, that they will create a new channel for the league. It launched on August 13, 2010 and it's called Viasat Premier League HD.
On September 7, 2010, MTG are launching the new free-to-air sports channel TV10. It will take over much the sports previously broadcast on Viasat Sport, TV6 and TV8. Viasat Sport will remain, but will become an overflow channel for the other sports channels.
Read more about this topic: Viasat Sport (Sweden)
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