Sky Sports has signed a new multi-year deal to broadcast the Indian Premier League (IPL) in the UK and Ireland. The deal allows Sky to retain the IPL broadcast rights for the territory.

The global media rights of the IPL are held by 21st Century Fox-owned Star India. Fox also owns 39% stake in BSkyB and has signed a deal to acquire the remaining 61% stake for $15.6 billion.

Under the deal Sky Sports will broadcast 60 IPL matches live each year in the UK and Ireland, starting with the 2018 edition. The IPL 11th season is slated to on 7 April. The Sky-Star deal also includes digital rights. This means that Star’s video on demand (VoD) service Hotstar will not be streaming the IPL in the UK.

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Star was planning to use IPL to strengthen Hotstar’s presence in global markets like US and UK. In 2014, Sky had signed a three-year deal to broadcast the IPL for the first time in UK and Ireland.

Star India last year had acquired all IPL media rights for ₹16,347.5 crore ($2.55 million) for a five-year (2018-2022) cycle.