The TV rights thread

[Noa]

Gallop must have thought after the Storm saga he had the autonomy to make decisions on his own (with help from news). Good to see the merkin back-peddling.......now back peddle of a cliff

 

[supera]

todays backtracking has put a little grin on my face. i'd imagine its the result of 16 bollockings from 16 club ceos.

he cant lead the nrl in the ic era can he? as a news stooge. as someone who has acted contrary to the best interests of the game too many times, his time is surely up.

and if it wasnt, it should be after yesterday and today.

 

[Everlovin' Antichrist]

Step down now David. It's the only right thing for you to do.

Don't go out with everyone think you were a worse CEO than Moffett or Whittaker. At the moment, you have them beat.....just.

 

[bobmar28]

The IC will do the TV rights negotiating not Gallop.

 

[Fonzie]

I think Gallop is a pretty capable guy, so when he says stupid things like 'AFL deserve more for their TV rights' and 'it was naieve to think that the IC would happen before the 2011 season', I don't think its him talking.

 

[Ray Mosters]

OK, take this with a grain of salt because it came from a Melbournian channel 9 employee and not someone from 10, but I heard over the weekend that 10 are scaling back their commitment to AFL to just a single game on Saturday night, so that they can make a serious run at the NRL rights.

They want to make One HD the number 1 sport broadcaster in the country by running 2 Friday night games, 2 Sunday afternoon games, and the number 2 slot AFL game on the Saturday night.

The NRL will become their tent-pole property

 

[Ronnie Dobbs]

David Gallop is a gimp, a puppet & a totally useless administrator. I throw those terms broadly at the rest of his (mis)management team too.

I'm going to count to ten to avoid exploding......

1............2............................................................3...............


NAH. f**k IT! WE ARE GOING TO BE SCREWED OVER.


AGAIN.

Who's up for march to Fox Studios? The problem is this won't get reported outside of the Fairfax media. Ten has too much to gain and Nine has too much to lose. Seven don't care because they have the AFL. Fox Sports are a News Ltd company.

As said earlier in this thread, the fix IS in.

rort.

 

[El Diablo]

I posted earlier in this thread that a radio report in Melbourne said Ten were only getting 1 game a week and that was Saturday night. 9 were supposedly also getting 1 game a week and that was Monday

think it was something like this

7 Friday night and Sunday arvo AFL
10 Saturday night
9 Monday night

pay TV getting 5 games of AFL.

 

[Quidgybo]

Geez that makes Gallop sound totally incompetent. Either his original comments were taken out of context or he is doing a massive backflip!

The only logical context I could read into it was that Gallop was referring to how long it would take to complete the full merging of existing NRL and ARL operations into one organisation, not how long it would take to change boards at the top. In that context I think 12 months sounds exactly right. The new commissioners take their seats within the next couple months and then over the course of the next year the development operations of the current ARL are integrated into present NRL operations structures and the whole lot moved to new head quarters. Like any corporate merger, although the new leadship takes over quickly, the actual logistics of merging across all levels takes considerably longer. I could see how a reporter looking for a scoop could take that and run the wrong direction with it.

Leigh.

 

[Ronnie Dobbs]

Geez that makes Gallop sound totally incompetent. Either his original comments were taken out of context or he is doing a massive backflip!

You had doubts about that PR. He's a News Ltd lacky. His forst and only loyalty is to them. He has the vision of a bat & the spine of a jelly fish.

The way I see it we need at least $850mill TV and $75mill Internet/other media to really drive the game forward over the next 5 years:

expansion of two teams and increasing of club grants
18x$6mill = $108mill
Increased funding to all grass root areas, inc affiliated states
$20mill
Expansion funding (Storm support, Reds development, other RL expansion areas development)
$10mill (reducing each year)
NRL admin
$40mill (CPI increase each year)
= $180mill a year

Anything less and we see RL treading water for another 5 years or having to tackle our issues underfunded.

I agree mate. Its pretty straight forward and simple. It would be called a business plan in ANY other business in the world. Not the NRL though. We'll get given what we're given by the company who owns us & made to subsist whilst they make massive profits from subscriptions to Foxtel on the basis of them using the NRL as THE cashcow. Gallop will probably get a nice kick back for keeping the price down, whilst a vastly under viewed comp in the AFL gets twice the money for a quarter of the viewers.

If this goes through at anything less than market value as in something like what you've outlined, I will cancel Fox immediately and I'd call on everyone else who loves and values the game and wants to see it flourish do likewise and see how Foxtel goes banking on AFL viewers for subscriptions.

Enough is enough.

 

[Quidgybo]

I posted earlier in this thread that a radio report in Melbourne said Ten were only getting 1 game a week and that was Saturday night. 9 were supposedly also getting 1 game a week and that was Monday

think it was something like this

7 Friday night and Sunday arvo AFL
10 Saturday night
9 Monday night

pay TV getting 5 games of AFL.

Which would leave plenty of room for competition between the networks and Fox for NRL games. Nine and Ten could fight it out for Friday nights; Seven and Nine for Saturday nights; Nine and Ten for Sundays; Seven and Ten for Monday nights; and of course Fox potentially contesting all those slots too.

Leigh

 

[El Diablo]

and all could fight it out for Origin seeing it's midweek

 

[docbrown]

Hopefully theyre still working together. If anything dodgy is to occur Ive no doubt these guys will have something to say.

Well I hadn't heard anything about this in ages. Wasn't sure if it was still happening but they need to forceful about it.

and all could fight it out for Origin seeing it's midweek

All Stars-Anzac Test-Origin I-Origin II-Origin III-Grand Final

All of those rate over 1.2million national (5 rater higher than 1.8million) and are 5 games that need to be split between the FTA providers to entice them to bid for club games as well.

With 3 F2A networks, each could rotate with one origin each and one of the other 3 big games.

 

[applesauce]

Well that is better news thing morning. But Gallop needs to go, seriously...

He is making the code look stupid and his administration incompetent. All the confidence and momentum will be with the networks if he keeps on portraying an ass about organisation.

I hope to god the NRL become the premier flagship for ONE HD. To be the biggest sport on the only FTA sports channel will do wonders for the code. No chance of being duded by BH&G or Friends re-runs.

 

[Ray Mosters]

I hope to god the NRL become the premier flagship for ONE HD. To be the biggest sport on the only FTA sports channel will do wonders for the code. No chance of being duded by BH&G or Friends re-runs.

Yep, and they have a commitment to quality HD broadcasting. And they are liable to play the games at good times all over the country too.

The only problem is Channel 9 having the first and last bid rights. To put Channel 9 out of the running 10s bid is going to have to be huge, and they are not an organisation with the deep pockets of 7 and 9.

This could be especially troublesome with regard to contractually obligating the game onto screens at good times all around the country. That sort of thing is not covered by the "first and last bid" agreement, which probably only covers the monetary and advertising-contra value.

Meaning, if 10 bids "we will give you 150 million a year and show it all around the country", channel 9 can win the bid with "we will give you 150.01 million and not show it outside the heartland". At that point we have no choice, 9 win it and are therefore our broadcaster.

Sure is interesting though

 

[El Diablo]

think you might be wrong there as 7 and 10 had the first and last rights bid offer for AFL last time and had to match everything 9 promised, not just the money

 

[docbrown]

7 is in a good financial position, it can afford both 2 weekly AFL & NRL matches - plus Rugby League rep matches. 9's position is a bit more sketchy which is why if a serious contender - 7 - wants to go for one of their NRL days, I doubt 9 could put up much of a fight. Before that story I wouldn't have rated 10 at all except for rep matches. But if 10 are getting a big cash free up from Saturday Arvo AFL, then that's a whole different story. They as well could steal 1 NRL game a week.

I keep thinking about that potential AFL break up -
Friday 7:30pm 7
Saturday 2:00pm Fox
Saturday 2:00pm Fox
Saturday 7:30pm Fox
Saturday 7:30pm 10
Sunday 1:30pm Fox
Sunday 3:00pm 7
Sunday 4:30pm Fox
Monday 7:30pm 9

10 is paying less and not competing against the other F2A networks. 7 seems focused on Friday & that Sunday news lead in and seemingly has abandoned the Monday nights to free up its resources. 9 hasn't gone for those other F2A slots and instead gone to secure Mondays alone. If 9 know 7 has dropped out and know 7 has reserves for NRL, they're not going to overbid for Mondays. It just seems to me that there's a distinct lack of competiveness there between the F2A networks. The one to benefit is Fox get another non competitive slot. Now whilst 9 will pay more for Mondays than what 10 did for Saturday arvo, most of their increase will come from Fox & CPI.

My prediction: the AFL's 2nd tier comp on Saturdays @ 5pm will only run for one season before Fox drops it to shift so they can have Saturdays @ 1:30pm, 4:30pm & 7:30pm

 

[Ray Mosters]

think you might be wrong there as 7 and 10 had the first and last rights bid offer for AFL last time and had to match everything 9 promised, not just the money

Did they though?

I seem to recall that the AFL really wanted to go with 9 and were mighty pissed at being forced to take the 7/10 deal. I thought it had to do with certain conditions in the 7/10 bid compared to the 9 bid

But I don't recall exactly.

 

[BuffaloRules]

Does 9 really have the last rights for the FTA NRL?

Not heard that before...

 

[meltiger]

think you might be wrong there as 7 and 10 had the first and last rights bid offer for AFL last time and had to match everything 9 promised, not just the money

100% right

Seven matched the money Kerry put up but the AFL told them to go away as they believed the additional exposure in 9s offer around coverage levels in northern states / foxtel meant that the overall value of 9s offer outweighed 7s and therefore they hadn't matched their offer.

The contract with 7 wasn't finalized until long after the event. At one stage it looked like they were going tohave to put fnf into Sydney up against the League (lol)

RM is kind of correct. They accepted 9s bid which contained the best northern coverage, and when 7 matched the dollars told them to go away and fix the Sydney/brisbane aspect.

That's how they were able to force through the much better coverage levels they have. We could theoretically do same if say One HD offer updecent coverage levels in the developing states.