EA Sports has bought the video game license for Italy’s top-flight football league, but the deal was agreed well before Fifa 19 cover star Cristiano Ronaldo signed for Serie A champions Juventus.
Talks between EA Sports and Serie A were made public by Italian press sources in May, after EA Sports had failed to secure the rights to Serie A in previous negotiations for Fifa 17 and Fifa 18.
The deal means that EA Sports not only holds the license for four out of the top five European leagues – rival firm Konami holds the license for France’s Ligue 1 – but EA also has a stranglehold on elite club football in Europe, having acquired the rights to the Uefa Champions League and Uefa Europa League in April.
But Ronaldo’s transfer from Real Madrid to Juventus did force one change to this season’s Fifa instalment, in the form of a newly photoshopped cover image.
Set to be released on September 28, the previous cover image of Ronaldo in a Real Madrid kit has now been photoshopped over with a Juventus kit.
For a round-up of the biggest EA Sports club and league deals read ‘EA Sports renews with Real Madrid, gets Ronaldo as cover star’ from Sports Sponsorship Insider, August 21, 2017.