Where to for Super Rugby?
- Thread starter Quick Hands
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BDA
Peter Johnson (47)
Yeh but you get the marque games each week, plus the finals, state of origin, etc. You can go to the pub for the rest. It's not the same as rugby where there are zero games on FTA
Slim 293
Stirling Mortlock (74)
Seven broadcasts anywhere between 3 - 5 games a week depending on the schedule.........
They have all the major prime time matches on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights, plus the Sunday afternoon game.......... which essentially guarantees them all of the blockbusters.
They also have all of the finals, and the ANZAC clash
Slim 293
Stirling Mortlock (74)
But going back to BDA's point......... the old Foxtel model of paying a fortune every year for the box hooked up to your TV is outdated, expensive, and I'd be surprised if they get many people under 40 still signing up for it.
Fox also have dedicated channels for their big three sports - cricket, NRL and AFL (all three also having a major FTA presence) , and they need to fill content for another four channels (which they currently can not).........
Rugby would definitely be one of their biggest sports (after motor racing) without its own dedicated channel, and losing rugby would be a massive loss for them in terms of subscribers, advertising dollars etc.
Fox also have dedicated channels for their big three sports - cricket, NRL and AFL (all three also having a major FTA presence) , and they need to fill content for another four channels (which they currently can not).........
Rugby would definitely be one of their biggest sports (after motor racing) without its own dedicated channel, and losing rugby would be a massive loss for them in terms of subscribers, advertising dollars etc.
Pone's Mullet
Ron Walden (29)
"Prime Minister Scott Morrison has just announced the proposal - which will largely benefit sporting matches.
He said mid-sized stadiums would be able to have a quarter of their 40,000 seats filled - and the same goes for outdoor cultural events.
Crowds will be allowed if patrons are ticketed and seated, and maintain a 1.5m (4.9ft) distance. Australia's football codes have been lobbying hard in recent weeks for spectators to return to stadiums.
The allowance falls under Stage 3 - the final phase of the country's plan to come out of lockdown."
He said mid-sized stadiums would be able to have a quarter of their 40,000 seats filled - and the same goes for outdoor cultural events.
Crowds will be allowed if patrons are ticketed and seated, and maintain a 1.5m (4.9ft) distance. Australia's football codes have been lobbying hard in recent weeks for spectators to return to stadiums.
The allowance falls under Stage 3 - the final phase of the country's plan to come out of lockdown."
RedsHappy
Tony Shaw (54)
That's exactly the calculus they'd now make, and much more ruthlessly than in the past (ie, 2015 and prior). They have exited the hubris and extravagance phase, and entered the survival one.
Plus Barb: Foxtel's cost base just begins with the raw rights' costs paid to RA. Then they have all-of-season production (management and on-field), commentariat, transmission, insurances, costs etc. There are bandwidth costs for Foxtel Now and Kayo.
Finally, their goal in the 2020 Foxtel realities has to be: make a profit on rugby, not just cover costs. Otherwise, why bother.
My guess is today they would want this: (1) Foxtel's total advertising-on-rugby $ income (that would not simply move to other Foxtel broadcasted codes if Foxtel lost rugby) + (2) imputed subscriber $ income directly related to rugby and that'd leave if no rugby (hard to estimate but they'd have a view on this for sure) = (3) TOTAL RUGBY INCOME minus (4) all costs noted above incl RA rights payments plus (5) a % share of Foxtel's general HQ costs = (6) 'Rugby EBIT Profit' and where (6) has to be at least 20-25% of (3).
My belief is their economic interest in rugby by 2019/early 2020 declined simply because (a) they had overpaid badly for sports rights all over the place, virtually admitted so and lived to regret it financially and (b) all rugby's key Test and Super metrics were declining badly in terms of viewership, crowd sizes, advertising income, media buzz, etc.
[Finally, an aside: with all the Foxtel hate and pissing on them here, it's unarguable that in no way would FTA ever have paid anything like the media rights $s that Foxtel has paid RA over a long period, not even vaguely close.]
formerflanker
Ken Catchpole (46)
Hmmmmm - could we get 10,000 to watch the 'Tahs these days?
We will see.
KOB1987
John Eales (66)
I think the biggest they will play in is Parra, so more like 7500. I think everyone is starved for sport and with only Aussie derbies being played they will fill that in a heartbeat.
The thing that confused me was that someone asked the question about why they couldn't just max out bigger stadiums like ANZ at 10,000k (I had wondered the same thing myself) and the response was something about that being a work in progress. Why not just do the 10K thing for now?
Omar Comin'
Chilla Wilson (44)
I think this is definitely true in the context of international competition, and that includes Super Rugby. So if most of our teams are doing poorly each week against NZ teams then that's a problem as we've seen.
But with an actual domestic competition the quality or strength of teams would be less important than the entertainment value and rivalry among fans. Quality can't be obviously low or amateurish but the teams wouldn't necessarily need to be as strong as the current Super Rugby sides are now in order to attract more support than Super Rugby has in the past 10 years. The best teams in the competition each year would be Australian based teams regardless of the quality of Australian rugby relative to other countries (and particularly NZ). Plus, rugby has an international player and coaching pool and with an 8-10 team league it wouldn't matter if a third or more of the players and coaching staff were foreign.
A final point I'd make is that as you increase the quality of rugby teams it doesn't necessarily increase the entertainment value of the rugby. For example the 2019 Springboks and Welsh national team were pretty high quality rugby sides but if rugby was regularly played the way those teams did in last year's world cup semi final the sport would die quickly in Australia.
Slim 293
Stirling Mortlock (74)
So, goal line drop outs............
https://www.rugby.com.au/news/2020/06/12/super-rugby-au-law-changes
I don't really see the point?
https://www.rugby.com.au/news/2020/06/12/super-rugby-au-law-changes
I don't really see the point?
waiopehu oldboy
Stirling Mortlock (74)
Agree with Red card replacement & golden point (but only in the context of a short format comp), don't see the point if the rest. If you want to get rid of scrum resets limit it to one, after that it's a FK to the attacking team.
Jimmy_Crouch
Ken Catchpole (46)
My preference would be for games that go to Super Point. Winner takes 3 points (rather than 4) Loser takes 1 (+1 for the bonus point of losing by less than seven. So a 3 to 2 split seems fairer if there are no draws.
waiopehu oldboy
Stirling Mortlock (74)
^ I'd be happy with that.
Slim 293
Stirling Mortlock (74)
What puzzles me, is that except in the instance of being held up (and I didn't care for that rule at all in the NRC), all of the other situations already result in a 22m restart......... so essentially we're scrapping competition for the ball, and I don't see any upside in that?
Quick Hands
David Wilson (68)
Without necessarily agreeing with the changes, my assumption is that the thinking is to get the ball back into play more quickly. The defending side will be able to take the line drop out quickly and it would be in its interest to do so before the attacking players can get back into position.
What the league 6 again rule has shown in that the more periods of continuous play there are the more fatigued both sides become and the defensive team has less opportunities to stop the play to allow defence to regroup and reset. The time taken for the scrum to set itself up these days is far too long, let alone the actual scrum with resets and contrived penalties when the ball is already won.
Like it or not, rugby is in the entertainment business and there's only a limited class of people who like watching 16 people spend a minute preparing for what in most cases at the pro level is a forgone conclusion.
For all the huffing and puffing about contests at the scrum, at the elite level there's roughly the same percentage of scrums won by the team putting the ball into the scrum in both league and union; i.e. just under 100%.
That said, I'll reserve judgement about whether this is the right way to achieve the desired result of ball in play quickly and continuously.
Quick Hands
David Wilson (68)
Perhaps you're right. We won't know until we've seen it in operation.
This will be quicker potentially as the ball is already in the in goal area.
Bear in mind that the kick can be taken from anywhere in the in-goal area, it's not like league under the posts so the ball could be passed across and taken quickly short or long depending on where the attacking players are.
EDIT: I'd add that these aren't variations that I'd be suggesting if I was asked, but I can see what the intent is. If they don't work then there's nothing really lost in this competition.
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