Rugby League's TV deal

[gotitans101]

But for me, it works ok. Let the Donkies keep their Friday nights & Ray Hadley, and let CH9 have their money making love fest with them. I enjoy Titans games much more when they are broadcast on Fox. It obviously costs money for the service, but at least all their games are live, commercial free, have pre & post game content and (usually) better commentry. Fox sports as a whole just seem to put more effort to providing a better service for rugby league viewers than CH9 ...

Same here, much prefer to watch our games on Fox then nein also!

[Ryan]

A quick expression of thought via photoshop.....

[DIEHARD]

Well Im excited by the figure, it's huge and the fairest deal we may have ever got.

But Im disappointed with the lack of innovation, nearly everything is the same except for the partial fixed draw, Sunday night games, night time Grand Final.

We really needed a LIVE FTA game on Saturday. Im sick and tired of gifting that to the AFL.

It's good to finally have an Anzac Day game on FTA. Also good to see the Storm v Warriors continue as a Pay TV product.

Night time Grand Final, I dislike but if it brings in the ratings so be it. It's not as bad as we dont have crappy daylight savings in QLD. But it'll never get moved to Saturday because of TV ratings Greg. Sunday prime time is the top shelf.

Who is gonna broadcast the World Cup? I hope that is the RLIF's domain to sell.

I kind of support Sunday evening games the same way and reasons I support MNF. But they are just the biggest downers for fans of the home team and now we have two of them. But hopefully some money can be deployed to ease the pain.

Im sick of the Broncos on NINE but as with a few of you, Id rather watch us on FOX. LIVE!

Disappointed there is no FOX LEAGUE channel.... But they should promote Rugby League the way they promoted AFL and see their subscribers boost. We suffered Super League for PAY TV and Im still waiting for my Titans remote control decal.

Delayed games are rubbish. And I cant believe AFL have all games LIVE ans simucast and we get a reheated dinner from last night.

No talk of expansion, seems NINE arent even interested in another SEQLD team and happy with the Broncos. Fox are more likely to favour Perth. But maybe that topic is for another day, at least we have the cash.

The contra will help promote our game, memberships and games.

The cash will help grow our game from the grassroots and hopefully nationally.

Im glad the Test Match is staying.

Im also shocked that it was announced so early, I guess Seven and Ten couldnt compete.

Also need to see how the online rights plays out and how much has been sold already.

[DIEHARD]

Also NINE and FOX have surrendered their FIRST and LAST bidding rights. Which is a very big win for the game.

[DIEHARD]

Fixed scheduling is also a huge boon. And we should promote our own away memberships along with the fix draw.

We should see an increase in travelling fans, which is good for the Gold Coast. We'd have to be a tempting destination!

[DIEHARD]

I would also like to know who will schedule the draw? The broadcasters or the ARL? Who does the AFL one? I imagine it'll be broadcasters, still a win.

[Rage]

The thing I was looking forward to the most was a revamp of FTA viewers and some more live games, as well as a Saturday match like Diehard mentioned. Guess I was hoping for too much..

[DIEHARD]

The thing I was looking forward to the most was a revamp of FTA viewers and some more live games, as well as a Saturday match like Diehard mentioned. Guess I was hoping for too much..

Yea mate, they have been just dropping their Lions and Swans in that free timeslot for years and years. Imagine if we blackballed them with putting on LIVE Rugby League. It'd have a huge toll on their fanbase. But we just let them do it and they keep doing it.

It'd be great for our game on its own merit and it'd blow a huge chunk off the AFL, it'd a massive advantage. I just cant believe that we leave the door wide open Saturday night Free To Air.

[DIEHARD]

Im interested to hear what Seven and Ten had on the table when it leaks out.

[Grimmace]

On the plus side of the deal at least everyone gets the chance to see the Broncos play on a friday night according to David Cygnell:
http://sportsbusinessinsider.com.au/...roadcast-deal/

- The Broncos are likely to play every home match on a Friday night. If they don?t like it, ?I don?t care,? says Gyngell, ?they?re going to do quite well out of the money they?re going to get from us.?

.............................. what a great attitude channel nine have......

[DIEHARD]

The Broncos dominance of Brisbane isnt fair.

[DIEHARD]

Rugby league must use windfall wisely

THE target was always $1 billion and the ARL Commission got that and more. Sure, it gave up something in return.

A Sunday night grand final is back on the agenda from next season. State of Origin will remain on Wednesday night, much to the chagrin of the players union. Expansion is on the backburner.

But any disappointment over the draining Origin period will be offest by what is headed the players' way. A sizeable chunk of the commission's billion-dollar broadcasting deal will be used to increase the salary cap. Some of game's elite are ready to cash in.

The likes of Johnathan Thurston and Jarryd Hayne are off contract at the end of next season - they are in line to become the latest million-dollar men.

Clubs are also headed for a period of prosperity unlike any in recent memory. Sydney teams have rarely returned a profit. Cronulla has lived on the breadline for years. This will be like manna from heaven.

Thanks to the Nine Network and Foxtel, the game now has the financial muscle to take the fight to the AFL. Rugby league clubs in western Sydney and the Gold Coast have had their nerves soothed. The game can launch a counter-attack if it so wishes. It's more likely the money will be used to shore up the game's heartland rather than return serve.

The greatest challenge for rugby league now is to make sure it uses its riches wisely. More money will come via New Zealand and digital media rights. It could be that the commission deal eventually out-strips the $1.253 billion paid to the AFL. That would be a victory for the ARLC chairman John Grant and his fellow commissioners, who have been criticised at times for moving too slowly.

Grant has always spoken of acting to get the best deal, not the fastest deal. It was hard to argue with his rationale today as he announced a broadcasting deal unlike any in the game's history. Grant described it as the greatest in the game's history. It was hard to argue.

While the commission will rightly be praised, the forgotten man yesterday was former chief execuitve David Gallop. Gallop deserves much of the credit for the game being in such good health. He helped put the game in position to cash in on its popularity. And how they cashed in.

As part of the new deal, $90 million will be paid in advance to help the game set up a future fund. Clubs can expect a significant increase in their grants. They want it to exceed the salary cap by $1 million. The players union will have something to say about that. They will want as much cash as possible for their players.

The days of crying poor are over. Rugby league is rich again but must not squander the windfall.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/

[Smakked]

The biggest concern now is where the money goes, i don't have alot of faith in the commission because they are not very transparent and they seem very disorganized.

[DIEHARD]

Free at last: new deal to benefit all levels
Roy Masters

The new Australian Rugby League Commission has delivered the code an outstanding stepping stone broadcasting deal, eclipsing anything done in the past and securing its media future by unshackling the onerous first and last rights provisions held by News Ltd until 2027.

The $1.025 billion five-year contract with incumbent rights holders Channel Nine and Fox Sports also sits well in the present, being comparable with the AFL's $1.25 billion deal signed last year, assuming the ARLC negotiates equivalent contracts with New Zealand television and Telstra.

While viewers will see little on-screen difference from the current split of three games on Nine and five on Fox Sports, other than a Sunday twilight match, the deal is a big win for players, clubs and, hopefully, development.

It more than doubles the $500million over six years from Nine and Fox Sports that expires at the end of this season and allows the code to take advantage of a technological revolution where sports can sell their product direct to consumers via internet devices.

However, for the next five years, Fox Sports have also won online rights, meaning it can offer subscribers games via tablet, a successful initiative used during the recent London Olympics.

A potential downside is if Telstra, who paid the AFL $153million for online rights, values the remaining mobile phone and online properties at significantly less, then the ARLC may struggle to achieve $1billion in cash, given that the cash component of yesterday's is $925 million.

Still, if Telstra, or another internet provider, pays half the money Telstra outlaid for AFL online rights, it will deliver $1 billion in cash, justifying the claim made by Nine boss David Gyngell yesterday that ''pound for pound'', the rugby league deal is better than the AFL's. Both codes receive $100 million in contra but on a pro-rata basis, the AFL has nine games to sell to broadcasters, compared to rugby league's eight.

While the money the ARLC receives from the yet-to-be-negotiated New Zealand TV rights should not be used in comparisons with the AFL, which does not have an equivalent team in another country, the fee will narrow the overall rights gap between the codes.

Sky TV in New Zealand currently pays $14 million per year to show NRL games but has protested it is paying too much.

Another important win for the new ARLC is the introduction of fixed scheduling for the first 20rounds of the season, bringing to an end the era where the programming of Friday night to Monday night games was decided between two and five weeks in advance.

Fans, particularly those who follow teams in Townsville, Melbourne, Brisbane, the Gold Coast, Canberra and Auckland, will be able to plan their winter weekends before Christmas.

It is understood Channel Ten made a serious bid of $800 million for four games, all in prime time, nationally, on Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday nights. This must have been a tempting offer, given Ten would be scheduling one more free-to-air game around Australia.

Presumably, any add-on by Fox Sports for the four games it would cover was less than $225million, otherwise it would have equalled the combined Nine/Fox Sports deal of $1.025 billion and been an attractive proposition because of superior national coverage.

However, Fox Sports desperately wanted to retain its Saturday and Monday night monopoly and the Ten offer would have ended this.

Still, it raises questions that an ARLC spokesman could not answer and yesterday's press conference did not reveal the Nine/Fox Sports split of the $1.025 billion fee, unlike the AFL deal where the free-to-air and pay TV amounts were announced separately.

Assuming Fox Sports stumped up half the $1.025 billion paid, it raises the question why they would be willing to pay less than half this for daylight games. The answer could lie with the last-minute involvement in negotiations of Kim Williams, the boss of News Ltd which half owns Fox Sports, who may have gazumped Lachlan Murdoch, chairman of Ten and a director of News Corporation.

Rugby league now has control over its broadcasting destiny from the expiry of the five-year deal, meaning it can take advantage of technological changes that will allow it to sell games direct to the public.

The AFL is positioning itself for afl.com.au where they will produce their own games and sell to subscribers, cutting out pay TV, such as Foxtel, while retaining some games for free-to-air TV to satisfy anti-siphoning requirements.

Until yesterday, rugby league was prevented from doing so because News Ltd's merely had to equal any broadcasting offer made up to 2027 to win the rights.

http://www.smh.com.au/rugby-league/

[DIEHARD]

The biggest concern now is where the money goes, i don't have alot of faith in the commission because they are not very transparent and they seem very disorganized.

I guess one thing is that should see some pretty astute investment and allocation of this money as our Commission is stacked with business minds.

While we may complain about little innovation for fans viewing, I think we will see some forward thinking when it comes to using it. Like investments in a Future Fund something we havent had since the ARL was forced to spend their own money, around a $12million warchest to fight the war in the mid 1990s and investments in grassroots and infrastructure and staffing.