{"id":15583,"date":"2026-10-08T12:42:47","date_gmt":"2026-10-08T12:42:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tewnet.com\/index\/?p=15583"},"modified":"2026-10-08T12:42:47","modified_gmt":"2026-10-08T12:42:47","slug":"ethiopian-premier-league-2026-27-starts-friday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tewnet.com\/index\/15583","title":{"rendered":"Ethiopian Premier League Starts Friday, With at Least 250 Games on Free TV"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-large\" src=\"https:\/\/tewnet.com\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/inbody-saint-george-fans-2018.jpg\" alt=\"Saint George supporters wait in line outside Addis Ababa Stadium before a home match, Addis Ababa, October 20, 2018 (Joehawkins \/ Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0) [file photo]\" style=\"max-width:100%;height:auto;\" \/><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><em>Saint George supporters wait in line outside Addis Ababa Stadium before a home match, Addis Ababa, October 20, 2018 (Joehawkins \/ Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0) [file photo]<\/em><\/p>\n<p>The 2026\/27 Ethiopian Premier League season begins on Friday, October 9, and many fans will be able to watch games for free on television. On Thursday, the Commercial Bank of Ethiopia (CBE) signed a deal to remain the league\u2019s name sponsor, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.soccerethiopia.net\/football\/108683\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Soccer Ethiopia<\/a> reported. The bank also held the naming rights last season.<\/p>\n<p>At the signing ceremony, Fisseha Belayneh, chief executive of Oromia Broadcasting Network (OBN) Television, said the channel will show at least 250 games live this season. He said the broadcasts will be free and of better quality than last year. Last season, OBN covered games live from four stadiums and showed matches played at the same time in three local languages.<\/p>\n<p>Dereje Fufa, the acting president of CBE, said the bank was proud to support the league as part of its social responsibility work. According to Soccer Ethiopia, tickets will be sold only through CBE Birr, the bank\u2019s mobile money service. The report did not give the value of the deal.<\/p>\n<p>Kifle Seife, general manager of the Ethiopian Premier League Share Company, said the company has paid clubs 1.2 billion birr in total over the past several seasons. He added that it takes no share of stadium income.<\/p>\n<h2>A New Format and Seven Stadiums<\/h2>\n<p>Eighteen clubs will compete this season, including Halaba Ketema and Gamo Chencha, which earned promotion from the Higher League. Under a new rule, four clubs will drop to the Higher League at the end of the season and only two will be promoted. That will leave 16 clubs from the 2027\/28 season, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fanamc.com\/archives\/322763\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Fana Broadcasting Corporation<\/a> reported.<\/p>\n<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ena.et\/web\/amh\/w\/amh_9532578\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Ethiopian News Agency<\/a> (ENA) said games will be played at seven stadiums in Addis Ababa, Adama, Bahir Dar, Hawassa, Halaba, Hosaena and Arba Minch. The league has dropped midweek games, and matches will be held on Fridays, Saturdays, Sundays and Mondays.<\/p>\n<p>The league plans to finish the season before June 7, 2027, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.soccerethiopia.net\/football\/108468\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Soccer Ethiopia<\/a> reported.<\/p>\n<div class=\"jetpack-video-wrapper\"><span class=\"embed-youtube\" style=\"text-align:center; display: block;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"youtube-player\" width=\"780\" height=\"439\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/fRQ9M9B7Xp8?version=3&#038;rel=1&#038;showsearch=0&#038;showinfo=1&#038;iv_load_policy=1&#038;fs=1&#038;hl=en-US&#038;autohide=2&#038;wmode=transparent\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" style=\"border:0;\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-presentation allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox\"><\/iframe><\/span><\/div>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><em>Video: EBC Sport\u2019s \u201cChewata Podcast\u201d discusses the new season in seven cities and the 2019 E.C. fixture draw, in Amharic. Posted September 18, 2026.<\/em><\/p>\n<h2>Champions Open Against the Bank\u2019s Club<\/h2>\n<p>Sidama Bunna won the league for the first time last season. It begins its title defense against the CBE football club at Hawassa University Stadium. In first-week games in Addis Ababa, Ethio Electric meets Adama Ketema, Saint George (Kidus Giorgis) faces Negelle Arsi, and Ethiopia Bunna plays Sheger Ketema. The Addis Ababa derby between Saint George and Ethiopia Bunna will come in the second week, Fana said.<\/p>\n<p>Saint George starts the season with a familiar coach. In August, the club hired the Serbian coach Milutin \u201cMicho\u201d Sredojevic for a third time, on a three-year deal. In his earlier spells, from 2004 to 2006 and from 2007 to 2010, he won five league titles with the club, <a href=\"https:\/\/soccer.et\/2026\/08\/14\/micho-returns-to-saint-george-for-third-spell\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Soccer Ethiopia<\/a> reported.<\/p>\n<p>Ethiopia Bunna also signed a new sponsorship deal on Thursday. Habesha Beer, the club\u2019s partner for the past 12 years, agreed to pay 45 million birr a year for three more years, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.soccerethiopia.net\/football\/108691\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Soccer Ethiopia<\/a> reported. The brewery will add 13 million birr each year for other costs, and 15 million birr if the club wins the title this season.<\/p>\n<h2>African Games Change the Calendar<\/h2>\n<p>Two clubs also have games in Africa. Sidama Bunna beat Aiglons FC of Chad 3-0 over two legs in the CAF (Confederation of African Football) Champions League. It now meets Al-Hilal Omdurman of Sudan, with first legs set for October 16 to 18, <a href=\"https:\/\/beninwebtv.com\/en\/caf-champions-league-sidaama-buna-defeats-aiglons-3-0-and-will-face-al-hilal\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Benin Web TV<\/a> reported. Welwalo Adigrat University will play Al Ahli Tripoli of Libya in the CAF Confederation Cup. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ena.et\/web\/amh\/w\/amh_9611401\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">ENA<\/a> said the league will move the second, third and fourth week matches of both clubs to new dates.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Saint George supporters wait in line outside Addis Ababa Stadium before a home match, Addis Ababa, October 20, 2018 (Joehawkins \/ Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0) [file photo] The 2026\/27 Ethiopian Premier League season begins on Friday, October 9, and many fans will be able to watch games for free on television. On Thursday, the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":15581,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2,420,441],"tags":[629,702,790,791,795,697,789,797,796,792,794,793],"class_list":["post-15583","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-articles","category-news","category-sport","tag-addis-ababa","tag-african-football","tag-cbe-ethiopian-premier-league","tag-commercial-bank-of-ethiopia","tag-ethiopia-bunna","tag-ethiopia-football","tag-ethiopian-premier-league","tag-habesha-beer","tag-micho","tag-obn","tag-saint-george","tag-sidama-bunna"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9OJMY-43l","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/tewnet.com\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/featured-addis-ababa-stadium-2018.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tewnet.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15583","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tewnet.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tewnet.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tewnet.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tewnet.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15583"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tewnet.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15583\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15584,"href":"https:\/\/tewnet.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15583\/revisions\/15584"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tewnet.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15581"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tewnet.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15583"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tewnet.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15583"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tewnet.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15583"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}