Eurosport's availability could be reduced as part of the dispute with Sky ©Eurosport

Access to television channels, including Eurosport, could be severely reduced in the United Kingdom from next month due to a dispute between Sky and Discovery.

Eurosport stations 1 and 2 are among 13 channels currently at the centre of a public row between Sky and parent-company Discovery Communications.

Discovery claim that Sky is refusing to pay a "fair price" considering rising viewership.

They claim that their fees are less than they received a decade ago despite a 20 per cent rise in viewing figures.

Sky, however, dispute this "completely unrealistic" demand and claim they have been "overpaying Discovery for years".

All Discovery channels will be removed from Sky TV subscriptions from Tuesday (January 31) unless the dispute is resolved.

Viewers in the UK would therefore have to specially purchase the channel separately or sign-up to another provider, such as Virgin Media.

Discovery have been running adverts claiming that Sky are more interested in paying huge fees to show English Premier League football rather than other sports. 

Discovery and the International Olympic Committee (IOC) unveiled a landmark €1.3 billion (£926 million/$1.5 billion) deal in 2015 for Eurosport to broadcast the next two Olympic cycles.

Eurosport gained exclusive European rights to show the Olympics in 2015, but the BBC has since brought back UK coverage ©Eurosport
Eurosport gained exclusive European rights to show the Olympics in 2015, but the BBC has since brought back UK coverage ©Eurosport

The BBC already had UK rights for Pyeongchang 2018 and Tokyo 2020, and have since brought the rights from Beijing 2022 and the yet-to-be-awarded 2024 Summer Games back from Discovery.

Discovery will, however, sub-license back exclusive pay-TV rights in the UK to the 2018 and 2020 Olympic Games to be shown on Eurosport.

Eurosport also holds rights to dozens of major events in Summer and Winter Olympic sport.

This includes World and European Athletics Championships, for which rights are partly or fully shared with the BBC, and major tournaments and stage races in tennis and cycling.

Eurosport holds live rights for the Australian Open, French Open and US Open tennis Grand Slams.

It also screens Giro d'Italia and Vuelta a España cycling races, as well as sharing live daily coverage of the Tour de France with ITV.

A total of 24 races on the International Cycling Union World Tour are also shown live on Eurosport.

Winter sport would also be hit hard, with skiing World Cup and World Championships events due to be screened live until 2020-2021.