More rugby should be on Aussie free to air TV
Roar Pro
By John Hanrahan, 5 Aug 2009 The Crowd is a Roar Pro
119 Have your say
It’s time for an Australian television channel to start showing French and Japanese rugby. With the enormous number of Aussie rugby and league stars playing in these competitions, interest in the games is growing daily.
Add to the Aussies the number of other international rugby stars playing in the French competition and Kiwis playing in the Japanese sides and you have a rich spread of interest and potential.
Wallabies, Super 14, All Blacks, Springboks, Irish, Argentinian, British and French stars are littered throughout the French competition.
A match like the Brumbies clash with Toulon featuring Sonny Bill Williams and Jonny Wilkinson, though a one-off, is another example of what we’re missing.
While rugby and other sporting fans can find information about their favourite footballers playing in these international leagues on websites, being able to watch the games is clearly what fans want.
The hits on websites like this one and other sporting sites carrying Rugby runs in to the tens of millions.
The addition of the matches from Europe and Japan would be just what the pay-tv operators, in particular, desperately want – more new subscribers.
And into that mix should be thrown either replays of Sydney Premier Rugby’s ABC-TV Match of the Day or, at the very least, a one hour’s highlights package.
The ABC telecast is on while 95 percent of rugby fans are either playing or attending hundreds of junior and senior games around the city. And ABC-TV news can’t even bring themselves to screen one moment’s highlights of the game in their 7pm. news sports round-up.
The first step would be for Fox Sports to do a trade-off with some of the highlights from their matches for the ABC footage.
Premier Rugby, featuring a host of Super 14 players, should then get multiple replays through the week at times that Rugby fans can actually watch it.
The first objection that would be raised would be the language barrier. Obviously the French and Japanese games are broadcast in the native tongues of both countries.
But these days, at the Seven Network and as other broadcasters have done, they’ve not bothered to spend the money to send their commentators to cover matches “live” but rather called them from the studios in Sydney.
And with the right up-to-date information (players, after all, have numbers on their backs) good commentators and producers who do their homework could call them games easily.
There might even be the facility to find an English speaking commentator in each country who could use one of the broadcast boxes to provide a “local” call, matched with the primary broadcaster’s vision.
Adding to rugby fans’ frustrations is the overwhelming volume of tedious league games being broadcast, with their girly scrums, repetition and predictability. And with overwrought commentary that often far exceeds the activities on the field.
Rugby fans, who want the big, explosive, dynamic action and unpredictability of a rugby match are becoming increasingly fed-up, particularly when they are aware of so many entertaining matches being played in Europe and Japan – but there is no opportunity at the moment to see them.
If Fox Sports won’t do it, Seven or Ten could show some initiative and get the rights to these games and build a new audience, with new sponsors and a new revenue stream.
However, it will take a combination of a television executive with some initiative and vision and a rugby fan base to make some “noise” by contacting the television stations and asking for these games.
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Michael C said | August 5th 2009 @ 6:37am | Report comment
Huh!??!!?
There’d be more interest in the HAL going on FTA. Let alone some overseas Rugby League being broadcast solely into Sydney and Brisbane.
But – like everything, make the advertisers and the networks interested enough in the business case and make it happen.
The Link said | August 5th 2009 @ 12:16pm | Report comment
MC, already happening re OS RL, English Super League is on Sunday afternoons on Ch9 2-4.
The Answer said | August 5th 2009 @ 7:44pm | Report comment
And I believe as many people watch that delayed replay of the English Super League than they do the Swans live!
Gee rugby league is struggling!
macavity said | August 5th 2009 @ 8:10am | Report comment
I LOLed.
Nick said | August 5th 2009 @ 9:22am | Report comment
Mate Japanese rugby is barely shown on Japanese TV, the odds on it ever coming to Australian TV is naught.
And Sentanta does show Heineken Cup and Challenge Cup Games…
Yikes said | August 5th 2009 @ 9:53am | Report comment
Well, French games do have English commentary already.
In addition, I cannot see why Foxtel can’t license The Rugby Channel from NZ. What cost would there be for Fox? Virtually none. Just add another channel. The programming is already being done!
The Link said | August 5th 2009 @ 12:33pm | Report comment
So Sky’s fee would be ‘vurtually’ nothing? I seriously doubt it.
Yikes said | August 5th 2009 @ 5:03pm | Report comment
Isn’t it and Foxtel owned by the same company? Or is that the UK Sky?
Yikes said | August 5th 2009 @ 5:07pm | Report comment
I’ve looked into it and News Corp owns 25% of Foxtel and 44% of SKY NZ.
So, Link I think a deal could be pretty easily done.
sheek said | August 5th 2009 @ 10:14am | Report comment
The problem here is simple. Not enough Australians like rugby union.
For Australia to have more rugby union shown, they would have to turn the world upside down. Start winning everything, & play attractive rugby consistently. Bring in the fans in their droves. Then maybe…..
For a dedicated RU channel in Australia, it would have to be funded by the ARU & vested interests themselves. And they don’t have the money.
Simmo said | August 5th 2009 @ 11:49am | Report comment
Don’t we all want more of our favourite footy code on the telly?
Gary said | August 5th 2009 @ 11:54am | Report comment
We do need Rugby on free to air, and yes it would be better if ABC was to delay the telecast of Shute Shied so it isn’t on when a lot of us are actually playing.
The Link said | August 5th 2009 @ 12:30pm | Report comment
What’s the commercial proposition?
Free to Air – Wallabies rate OK on FTA, but generally don’t rate as well as RL or AFL in Australia. Not sure of the ratings for Sat Club Rugby. So basically you’re treading in the unknown. The irony is you’d need to market the ex-RL players in these leagues to generate interest (similar to SBW with the Barbarians game in Sydney). Best bet would be Channel 10 One Sport as filler or to make a clause in the Wallabies next FTA deal.
Pay TV – Proposition would need to be based principally on subscriber growth. Rugby is arguably close to saturation with Super Rugby, who are the extra fans that will sign up? Rugby does not rate very well on Pay TV anyway.
You may despise RL, but its the preferred Rugby code in Australia, better get used to it.
Gary said | August 8th 2009 @ 11:37am | Report comment
No League s not the the preferred Rugby Code in Australia. It’s the preferred code in NSW and Queensland if you understand the difference. In WA League barely rates a mention whereas Union is exploding in popularity.
JF said | August 5th 2009 @ 12:39pm | Report comment
I feel you pain John.
It is just so difficult to be a rugby supporter in this country. With ONE HD now on the scene I can watch even more bloody AFL, Baseball, Wrestling, Nascar, couple this with nine’s NRL and Super League coverage, Seven and Ten’s AFL coverage and of course SBS’ constant barage of international soccer fixtures, as a rugby supporter I am left with nothing!
gatesy said | August 5th 2009 @ 12:46pm | Report comment
Spot on, John,
As you can see from the knockers above, the good old Aussie mentality of not wanting to try something new is alive and well. As a Brumbies fan, I am highly frustrated that I can’t even get a one minute highlight of their French tour on the evening news.
Australian Rugby suffers from the mentality that if you are going to do something new, you have to get it perfect from the outset. Look at the debate on the National competition as an example. We seem to want an all or nothing approach. Why not just start with some sort of hybrid ( a club challenge comp or something) on a small scale and let it grow and evolve naturally?
Back to TV – the same principle applies – I believe in the “build it and they will come” approach. It just takes some bravery by one of our TV networks, who is prepared to step away from the “tried and true” (or should that be “tired and true”) approach.
Rugby can only grow in popularity if you expand its reach. I wonder how many of our readers actually go looking for interesting content on the web re other parts of the world, and how many just read the newspaper to get their Rugby content, from the “usual suspect” journos who push out the same rubbish every day. There is a lot going on in the wide world of Rugby, and it would be nice to see in on mainstream TV. One of the comments was that you can see international Rugby on Setanta. I gave up my subscription to Setanta, because 95% of it was soccer and sports that I’m not interested in.
Those of you Roarers with any influence in the media should push this as hard as possible.