Real Madrid's capture of Cristiano Ronaldo from Manchester United and Kaka from AC Milan, combined with Barcelona's victory in the Uefa Champions League, looks set to drive La Liga's international television rights to the next level.

ESPN has secured a share of the league's US broadcast rights. The division of games between the broadcaster's Spanish and English language channels leaves little doubt as to its prime target audience; 20 matches per season will be shown on ESPN2, while 95 will be screened on ESPN Deportes. 114 matches per season will be available online, while the Copa del Rey, Spain's national cup competition, will also be shown.

"We're excited that, about getting a premier league in the world at probably at the most exciting time in its recent history," said Lino Garcia, general manager at ESPN Deportes.

The broadcaster will sublicense the games from GolTV, the bilingual broadcaster. GolTV, which was founded by former Uruguay international and 1984 South American Footballer of the Year Enzo Francescoli in 2003, screens more than 8000 hours of soccer action every year, and has held the rights to La Liga for the last six years. GolTV chief operating officer Rodrigo Lombello said of the deal with ESPN: "Technically it is a sublicensing deal. But it's deeper than that, because we really want to promote La Liga and make sure it's the number one soccer league. We are partners on the programming side. It makes sense we are partners on the financial side as well."

Soccer rights sales are currently flourishing in the USA. The country was the most lucrative in the world for Fifa when the world's governing body sold the rights to the 2010 World Cup. ESPN has also splashed out more than US$407 million for UK broadcast rights to the English Premier League.