Broadcast options for Australian Rugby

[formerflanker]

Seen elsewhere, today.
Is it a rumour or fact?
Fox Sports is set to walk away from rugby union, ending a 25-year broadcasting partnership that began when the game turned professional. Months of talks between Fox Sports and Rugby Australia came to a halt on Wednesday, and the struggling code will likely have to make a deal with Optus. Sources revealed RA chief executive Raelene Castle and Foxtel boss Patrick Delany have not spoken face to face in weeks, although emails had been traded.
The stunning development puts major pressure on rugby, with the game needing an extraordinary new deal to stay afloat. (The Australian)

 

[Derpus]

Kayo might survive but Foxtel is done. $90 for friends returns?

 

[kiap]

Errr, NRC?

Yep.

Seems like RA's (not-so-secret) Top Secret plan is to cull it.

Expand from 7 teams to 20. How good?

 

[Rebelsfan]

Seen elsewhere, today.
Is it a rumour or fact?
Fox Sports is set to walk away from rugby union, ending a 25-year broadcasting partnership that began when the game turned professional. Months of talks between Fox Sports and Rugby Australia came to a halt on Wednesday, and the struggling code will likely have to make a deal with Optus. Sources revealed RA chief executive Raelene Castle and Foxtel boss Patrick Delany have not spoken face to face in weeks, although emails had been traded.
The stunning development puts major pressure on rugby, with the game needing an extraordinary new deal to stay afloat. (The Australian)

Cant imagine Optus paying top dollar now that Fox Sports has walked. This weeks viewer numbers so woeful.

 

[fatprop]

Fox are being commercial, if they don't have the cash or they don't think they can get a return on the amount RA thinks they are worth you have to walk away

Personally I think that RA hasn't had a product worth what they want for years

They have been lucky that Fox needed content and funded Super Rugby, but we are now in a world where we are happier to buy 4 or 5 content providers instead of one aggregator - so they can't afford some of the less profitable content

RA will end up somewhere and we will have to find another $10 a month

If we are lucky Optus will pony up to fill the in their content over our winter

 

[Derpus]

Optus just shelled out fornthe J League. Maybe they are in a buying moos.

 

[redstragic]

This sucks, I'll be pissed off if I have to subscribe to a new service just to watch the Reds. Last weekend the viewing audience apparently averaged 33k. Why would Optus touch that?

 

[John S]

^^ I'm the same (except for the 'Tahs (not that some people would think they're worth watching). Then I'd be torn - do I keep Kayo so I can watch other sports (F1, 6 Nations etc), or just drop something. Not sure I can do two subscriptions.

 

[barbarian]

I'll wait until we end up with a final result until I judge how it all went. I find this whole thing quite confusing and don't really trust anyone.

That said, news that Fox is publicly walking away is hardly something we should celebrate. At very least it means one less bidder in the market, which can't be good for our end price.

 

[Zero_Cool]

I found it very interesting when I looked at the headlines from the Murdoch Press:
Rugby on its knees after $285m blow
Rugby blows its Fox Sports deal
25-year break-up has Australian rugby on life support

Yet this isn't very news worthy for other new organisations, with the Australian (owned by 9) wrote about how the Shute Shield impact on the rights deal.

I think Fox is just being commercial and trying to force the ARU's hand for a lower price; there is no reason (that I am aware of) Fox Sports couldn't bid during the open tender process. Moreover I'm not sure that what Fox say is going to have any impact on Optus, ultimately just because Fox say 'we're taking our ball and our bat and going home.' doesn't mean they are going home.

 

[Ignoto]

For the other sports Optus has picked up, are they showing it in full HD are is it the shitty 720p quality? I share my Kayo account with my FIL to watch the EPL on his Optus account. There is a HUGE difference in video quality to the point its actually difficult making out players and where the ball is.

 

[liquor box]

if the new deal is significantly lower what happens to player contracts?

Is money put aside to cover wages into the future, will no deal mean that RA cannot honor its contracts?

 

[kiap]

news that Fox is publicly walking away is hardly something we should celebrate

Is that really news, though?

Foxtel/Fox Sports is "publicly" walking away. Well, okay. But it's a punctuation mark in a story that's been known a long time. 2 billion dollars evaporated in two years. The idea that they had a big bag of cash just waiting to bid up an inflated price for Rugby Australia was never real.

And the thing is, that wouldn't change much even if RA was running smoother - because the business case for big package pay TV is in terminal decline.

Rugby moving away from that is needed to survive.

 

[Strewthcobber]

if the new deal is significantly lower what happens to player contracts?

Is money put aside to cover wages into the future, will no deal mean that RA cannot honor its contracts?

The current CBA runs out at the end of the year, SO everyone will have to renegotiate but the players get a fixed percentage of income. If income drops substantially, the players will be paid less.
RA currently makes pretty much half their revenue from broadcasting deals

RA have $20m+ in the bank so they will be able to pay existing commitments. But future commitments will have to be much less you'd imagine

 

[fatprop]

Some background, Foxtel is f*cked

https://www.crikey.com.au/2019/09/25/news-corp-foxtel-debt-repayment/

There is a further US$150 million (around A$220 million) due on December 28, and if that is dealt with via a shareholder loan it will mean that by the end of 2019 News Corp will have lent Foxtel the best part of A$1.05 billion. News already lent A$500 million by June 30 to allow it to repay loans which fell due in the first half of 2019. There was another A$220 million due on July 25.

 

[Rebelsfan]

The current CBA runs out at the end of the year, SO everyone will have to renegotiate but the players get a fixed percentage of income. If income drops substantially, the players will be paid less.
RA currently makes pretty much half their revenue from broadcasting deals

RA have $20m+ in the bank so they will be able to pay existing commitments. But future commitments will have to be much less you'd imagine

any club signing a player beyond 2020 would be doing so on a whim as no franchise knows what funding they will get for player payments past this year. I think RA also co-sign the player contracts - could be wrong

 

[Wilson]

Optus just shelled out fornthe J League. Maybe they are in a buying moos.

Honestly I'm getting a bit excited about the possibility of rugby moving to Optus and them taking this same approach. Would be great to see them pick up Japanese Top League, the more exposure it gets the more economically viable Japan in top flight rugby becomes here.

 

[Pone's Mullet]

Very coincidental that a majority of the bombastic press is Murdoch owned:

Rugby on its knees after broadcaster walks away - News.com.au

Rugby Australia blows its Fox Sports broadcast deal -The Australian

I don't necessarily see Rugby being off Foxtel as a bad thing - In England, cricket coverage and F1 moved to Sky (Foxtel) and saw huge declines in support and participation.

The loss of revenue might be a short term hit, long term gain

 

[Wilson]

Very coincidental that a majority of the bombastic press is Murdoch owned:

Rugby on its knees after broadcaster walks away - News.com.au

Rugby Australia blows its Fox Sports broadcast deal -The Australian

I don't necessarily see Rugby being off Foxtel as a bad thing - In England, cricket coverage and F1 moved to Sky (Foxtel) and saw huge declines in support and participation.

The loss of revenue might be a short term hit, long term gain

Absolutely, the argument for sticking with fox has always been that we couldn't get as much money elsewhere. If we're going to take a hit it's a good opportunity to consider what we might be able to gain in the process.

 

[Tex]

As long as the deal keeps the cash flowing to RA and rugby on my screen I'm pretty agnostic about who is filming and broadcasting it. I can afford to pony up a few extra $$$ a month to get rugby, but as an Optus user hopefully it's even cheaper.

I'd also be chuffed if I didn't have to pay money to a News Corp company, but thems the breaks.