Football must win over free-to-air television
Columnist
By Adrian Musolino, 14 Jan 2010 Adrian Musolino is a Roar Expert
Daniel McBeen of the North Queensland Fury (left) is tackled by Rhyan Grant of Sydney FC during their round six A-League match at the Sydney Football Stadium in Sydney on Saturday, Sept. 12, 2009. North Queensland Fury beat Sydney FC 1-0. AAP Image/Sergio Dionisio
The news that ONE HD’s new football show will kickoff in the coming weeks will be greeted with mixed feelings from fans of the game.
While many will be glad the game, particularly the A-League, will receive more press, others will be skeptical, still be scarred by the history the game has with commercial networks.
Football fans seem to have an aversion to free-to-air commercial networks being involved in football, undoubtedly as result of the contrast between the outstanding commitment to the game of SBS and Fox Sports compared to the disastrous involvement of Channel 7 with Soccer Australia and Channel 9’s 2002 World Cup blunders (those dreaded time-zone delays!).
But ONE HD’s new football show, entitled World Football News, is a small but positive step for the game as it continues to try and win over the mainstream media.
It’s particularly positive for the local game with producers promising the A-League and the Socceroos will be the main focus for discussion on the panel show.
The A-League needs every last ounce of publicity it can get to compensate for the appalling lack of marketing, being hidden on pay television and the infancy of the league relative to its competition, and having a show discussing the league on free-to-air will increase the awareness of the competition, particularly with the finals approaching.
Awareness is the key, and it’s what free-to-air offers to a far greater extent than the limited Fox Sports.
We’ve discussed ad nauseam the difficulty football, particularly the A-League, has in winning over the mainstream media, but it is imperative for the future of the game and the franchises that it breaks through the current malaise and starts infiltrating this mainstream.
No Australian sport can survive solely in the isolation of Fox Sports; its reach is simply too limited.
If Fox Sports do retain the A-League at the next round of television rights, it is imperative for the game that a highlights show and, at minimum, one live game a week are made available to one of the free-to-air networks as part of the deal.
It may even be essential, not just imperative, for the sustainability of the league.
The rise of the digital platform and the likes of ONE HD gives the likes of the A-League a better negotiating point with Fox Sports, while the rise of the sports only channel has undoubtedly threatened Fox Sports’ point of distinction by building its own solid base of live sports coverage.
The fact that ONE HD is jumping on the football bandwagon with this new show may be seen by some as simply filling out its schedule, but it could well be a signal of intent from a network who tested the waters with live coverage of David Beckham’s visit to Sydney.
Ten and ONE HD could well be the saviour of the A-League.
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Marshall said | January 14th 2010 @ 2:43am | Report comment
A highlights package in FTA isn’t enough as there’s no insentive, excitement in watching. One live game per weekend is a must – and preferably one in a regular slot like Friday night games while making sure they’re blockbuster games, no Mariners V Adelaide please, like the AFL does for Friday night footy.
Kurt said | January 14th 2010 @ 3:23am | Report comment
One thing that interests me about discussions of this nature is that we never seem to be able to address the really interesting question – namely why Australia has such low rates of Pay TV penetration? My understanding is that we’re lower than pretty much every other major advanced economy, and have rates comparable with developing countries in regions such as Latin America. When you think about it this just doesn’t make sense – we’re enthusiastic adopters of new technology, are hardly averse to rampant consumer spending and are not exactly well served with brilliant FTA networks. So what’s the reason? Is it simply because no major sport has gone exclusively to Pay TV like the EPL did with Sky in the UK? That might explain some if it, but in the US pretty much everyone has Pay TV and yet there is still MLB, NFL and NBA on the few remaining FTA networks. Is it because Channels 7 & 9 are just so fantastic that people don’t feel the need to get it? Nah, don’t think so. Is it because we are such a cultured lot and don’t watch that much TV? Don’t think so either, particularly when I believe countries such as France and Italy have significantly higher penetration rates also.
Anyway, don’t know the answer but I bet there are plenty of people at Fox who would like to find out.
Marshall said | January 14th 2010 @ 4:06am | Report comment
Australian media and the public are far behind the times. Look at how slowly they’re embracing digital and multiple channels. Aussies will watch any crud that’s on 7, 9 and 10 and just accept it.
Beast-A-Tron said | January 14th 2010 @ 4:15am | Report comment
“Australian media and the public are far behind the times. Look at how slowly they’re embracing digital and multiple channels”
Presumptuous don’t you think?
Watching television does not make you cosmopolitan.
Kurt said | January 14th 2010 @ 4:31am | Report comment
Don’t think he’s saying that. The fact is when it comes to pay & digital tv we are way behind the times when compared with similar countries, whereas in other areas of technology (e.g. adoption of consumer electronics, mobile telephony, e-commerce) we’re a pretty innovative market.
Beast-A-Tron said | January 14th 2010 @ 5:18am | Report comment
“Aussies will watch any crud that’s on 7, 9 and 10 and just accept it.”
What of this generalisation then?
“whereas in other areas of technology (e.g. adoption of consumer electronics, mobile telephony, e-commerce) we’re a pretty innovative market.”
Not meaning to diminish Australian technological achievements, but other than CSIRO wi-fi technology, what have Aussies accomplished other developed countries have not?
Oh and our Internet Service Providers are appalling.
Kurt said | January 14th 2010 @ 5:37am | Report comment
I’m talking about adoption of technological innovations, not their development. As an example, take a look at the following. It lists internet usage by country in 2005. Australia is ranked 4th out of 44 countries with a rate of 698 per 1000 people. Only The Netherlands (739), Norway (735) and Sweden (764) came in higher. You’d find similar results for the adoption of a range of other technologies, except pay and digital TV. That’s the point I’m trying to make.
http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0883396.html
Beast-A-Tron said | January 14th 2010 @ 5:49am | Report comment
Well I don’t think being a ‘follower’ would set us at parity in “other areas of technology”, let alone ahead. Such is the globalised world.
Dean Pantio said | January 14th 2010 @ 11:36am | Report comment
The generalisation is accurate: Look at what the FTA providers have in their line up. It’s a self evident fact.
Beast-A-Tron said | January 15th 2010 @ 2:19pm | Report comment
Wrong. What you just typed was opinion, NOT fact.
Digital TV - meh said | January 14th 2010 @ 3:38pm | Report comment
Don’t see the big deal about Digital TV.
Have a huge flatscreen TV with Fotel IQ – why on Earth do I now need to upgrade it to Digital?
What’s the big deal?
vee14 said | January 14th 2010 @ 10:44pm | Report comment
umm if you have a new flatscreen tv, it comes with digital already so you dont need to worry about upgrading
Redb said | January 14th 2010 @ 4:54am | Report comment
If your an AFL fan you dont actually need Foxtel. 5 games on FTA per week in addition to 4 weekly football panel shows who really needs it?
For the record I do have Foxtel.
Redb
Al said | January 14th 2010 @ 7:57am | Report comment
In the vicball states perhaps, not in NSW/QLD.
BigAl said | January 14th 2010 @ 9:51am | Report comment
It’s a known that Cable penetration is far higher in NSW/QLD – hence the higher ratings for NRL on cable
Robbos said | January 14th 2010 @ 5:57am | Report comment
This is a very good question Kurt. I did speak to someone from Fox a couple of years ago who said that the trend for Pay TV pentration in countries similar to Australia was slow in the begining but once they reach a certain pentration say 30% of households (I can’t remember what it was), the pentration will take off to about 70% to 80% as the costs of Pay TV dropped.
He told me that Australia was on that cusp a couple of years ago & they expected pentration to take off, so not sure why it didn’t.
VooDoo said | January 14th 2010 @ 8:05am | Report comment
Possibly because all of the good shows are on free-to-air anyway? I live in North America, and when I visit Australia, it’s interesting to see how many “flagship” shows are aired on free-to-air networks. Aussies get a lot of prime time US and UK television at a spread of hours on free-to-air, often with several successful import shows playing back-to-back. Over here a channel might have one flagship show (Heroes, Gray’s Anatomy etc) and the cable networks will play the same one 8 times per night, with little else to fill out the schedule. Maybe that contributes to the Australian situation? North America has a lot of cable penetration and channels, but still have very little quality content.
Michael C said | January 14th 2010 @ 8:46am | Report comment
most other countries have a single major ‘football’ code – so, if that goes to PayTV, then everyone really must follow.
Australia is a tad bit different, 2 major winter footy codes, soccer domestically in summer and RU in their niche…..Australia is very much fragmented, and the more casual (or family oriented fan like myself) really doesn’t yet NEED to go the pay tv path. I used to have Fox (in the old FoxFooty channel days) – when I got a house full of babies and FoxFooty got dropped – then Fox lost me.
Fox needs to more fully secure AFL and/or NRL to really drive the next phase of take up. Using all their spare funds on the HAL would seem to me to be counter productive. To hope to push 30% to the realms of 70%, Fox needs to break the back of FTA on the AFL and/or the NRL. Fox has traditionally held a stronger hold over NRL – and NSW is it’s strongest penetration market. Their share of AFL games has last year gone from 3 of 8 to 4 of 8, however, that’ll soon only be 4 of 9.
AndyRoo said | January 14th 2010 @ 10:50am | Report comment
when I got a house full of babies and FoxFooty got dropped – then Fox lost me.
Not being able to watch TV sitting down without being attacked by a small child is bad for pay TV no doubt
Fox should have demanded compensation when Howard brought in the baby bonus…although i guess when they get to 16 they may become a plus.
Michael C said | January 14th 2010 @ 10:53am | Report comment
exactly –
(actually I was at the time most interested in watching international cricket -….y’know, Eng vs SthAf test matches etc —– but, you can’t commit enough TV watching time with kidlets)
now – the baby bonus was Costello’s ‘baby’ so to speak…..so, for the conspiracy theorists – it was a deliberate Melbourne/AFL plot to undermine PayTV and NRL.
(just being very silly)
ItsCalledFootball said | January 14th 2010 @ 9:12pm | Report comment
Robbos, because they didn’t drop the price of cable TV as its customer base grew, they increased it.
In India you get the same sort of pay TV we get for about 5 bucks a month and by 2012 they expect to have over 38 million subscribers, Japan 56 Million and China 165 million.
In Australia, we’ll never get those numbers.
Saji said | January 14th 2010 @ 8:26am | Report comment
I don’t know what pay TV costs in the US and the UK but it’s quite expensive here when you think of it as a percentage of the average household’s monthly income (or disposable income). I think it is expensive because we don’t have a huge population. The cost of broadcasting pay TV in the US and Australia are probably comparable. However, if 5% of the US population has it then the pay TV provider will receive a lot more revenue than if 5% of the Australian population has it. One would hope that the costs would drop as more people adopt pay TV here. Also, there is only one pay TV provider here. So the lack of competition means they can set whatever price they see fit. It’s simple supply and demand micro-economics.
Lazza said | January 14th 2010 @ 11:20am | Report comment
When broadband was similarly priced there was also a very low penetration rate. When they dropped the price to something reasonable then everyone got it.
The lack of competition is a big problem too and Foxtel may feel that 25% paying a fortune for the service is better than 80% paying a cheaper price. The AFL learned the hard way in the last round of TV contracts that you can’t negotiaite with a monopoly. Where else are you going to go?
Andrew said | January 14th 2010 @ 5:21pm | Report comment
Yeah, AFL is really disappointed in how the last TV contract worked out
albatross said | January 14th 2010 @ 3:14pm | Report comment
Cable TV is far too expensive and this is largely due to the fact that two crap cables are running past potential subscribers houses instead of just one decent one.
Other issues:
- the amount of time given over to adverts on Pay
- crap programs – with some being aired several times a year
- you can’t cherry pick channels and just pay for the ones you want – you have to take packages of channels – some of which you will never watch.
- dodgey signal quality – we get a decent signal only around 99% of the time (we just get pixels at least 10 mins a day – and the screen always breaks up at the critical moment)
- did I say crap programs?
The Answer said | January 14th 2010 @ 5:14pm | Report comment
Sky costs about the same in the UK.
deadman said | January 14th 2010 @ 8:26am | Report comment
Get rid of the Anti-Syphoning list NOW
Saji said | January 14th 2010 @ 8:59am | Report comment
Good point. The laws in Australia protect free-to-air. Any “major” sporting event has to be on free-to-air. So the casual sport follower has no real motivation to take up pay TV to watch the sporting events they are interested in seeing.
BigAl said | January 14th 2010 @ 9:59am | Report comment
The UK has a siphoning liist, and are planning to extend it – yet their cable takeup is high ?
Saji said | January 14th 2010 @ 10:43am | Report comment
But the league of their national sport is exclusively on pay TV. Leagues don’t qualify for the siphoning list
Glen said | January 16th 2010 @ 12:59am | Report comment
No… keep it.
Just because you (and I) can afford Foxtel, why should millions miss out on iconic sporting moments? Why should sport be the preserve of the middle class?
Keep it… an expand it in my opinion. Sport is for everyone.
whiskeymac said | January 14th 2010 @ 9:42am | Report comment
interesting points. sport certainly drove sky’s expansion in the UK, but not so much here with AFL, NRL and Cricket etc having good FTA sponsorship. for me if there was one major reason this would be it. and compared to USA – are we more expensive? many items seem to be cheaper there and more accessible. as for FRance etc… could it be the local content is adequately coveredby Canal+ or whoever and that there isnt as much interest in “foreign” productions?dunno.
now with the rise of FTA digital maybe one of pay tv’s features (a lot more choice and variety if not quality) will not be a factor.
Brian said | January 14th 2010 @ 12:04pm | Report comment
Pay TV subscriptions are low because of two reason I can think of.
1. Australians are conservatives who like the “ain’t broke don’t fix it” approach, i.e. we’re still a monarchy
2. Being such a large contitnent most of us live in houses rather than apartments, there is also a lack of cheap (illegal) workers in Aus compared to Eurooe ir US. End result is that pay tv costs are so much higher to install, in
Europe cable is usually cheaper
The second point leads to a third which is that due to costs pay TV only came to Australia in the 1990′s long after it was established elsewhere. The US had cable in the early 1980′s
Glen said | January 16th 2010 @ 12:47am | Report comment
It’s simple really… Australia has anti-siphoning laws that ban any sport of national interest being made exclusive. Therefore all the football codes, cricket, the Olympics, Comm games etc cannot be bought by a non-FTA network. Good thing too!!!!
The other consideration… economies of scale. Pay TV in Australia (2.2 people per sqare klm) has to provide much more remote infrastructure as say Brazil with 22.6 people per square klm or Argentina with 15 per square klm. Don’t even think about Europe!
The whole business model of exclusive sport for pay TV will never work in Australia.
Col the Bear said | January 14th 2010 @ 5:16am | Report comment
I think this is a positive move by the A League, I just wish one of the free to air stations ie. one HD , would start showing the NSW Cup RL games on tele as well, this would give this Comp the recognition it deserves then..instead of everyone being a critic to this comp..critics who have probably never actually watched one of these games but just listened to the main stream media..
the first weekend of this round will kick off in Feb, and there are double headers all that weekend..and for traditionalists.. there’s North sydney V western Suburbs and Newtown V Balmain..at the same venue.. believe it or not there is an interest in these type of game, and with the right promotion, will lift itself from where it stands at the moment..
but you just can’t help feeling theres a few agendas around to keep this comp where it is..and for the record I don’t have Fox and never have..give me back my Bears and I’ll think about it.
Robbos said | January 14th 2010 @ 6:21am | Report comment
I think you need to understand where football in this country was at the begining of this decade to appreciate where we are now. The NSL was never going to be a mainstream competition, the socceroos were continuing their life long search for world cup glory with not much hope in sight under the former adminstration.
The A-League has given be a sense of belonging to a professional football (soccer) team I have never had in all my years. I was a diehard St George supporter but not a diehard Rugby League fan, much prefered Football & Rugby. I now follow Sydney FC with passion & my feelings for St George has waned. But I know many football people who are still Manly, Souths or Tigers fans & not follow the A-League.
A FTA TV live match or even a highlights show will help increase interest in the local competition especially amongst kids, who just love all sports.
I got Foxtel to watch football, (don’t tell the wife), the A-league is a big part of that, the A-league does not compete with the AFL & the NRL, im not kiding myself, but I’m happy of where the local competition is compared to what it was. I can still see the best players in the world in the EPL, the champions league & the world cup where my beloved Socceroos will play in their 2nd straight World cup finals.
moo cow said | January 14th 2010 @ 7:46am | Report comment
It is extremely important that the A-league get’s onto free-to-air. I wouldn’t mind if channel Ten/One get’s the rights to the A-league so long as they show the same passion they do for AFL, then I can see the Australian football landscape improving immensely. If only 30% or whatever people have Foxtel and maybe only half have Fox Sports and maybe only half of that watch the A-league then expanding it to everyone in Australia should provide huge benefits for the game. I’d even suggest crowd figures almost doubling, if not more in the short term. Who knows? Maybe crowd figures will get bigger than the AFL, or am I just thinking to far ahead? Well if we can like this game so passionately then why can’t the rest of Australia especially the one’s who don’t have access many of the games?
Jeb said | January 14th 2010 @ 7:51am | Report comment
It’s a no-brainer that sports need fta exposure to grow. Channell ten actually has the track record of really getting behind sports and being integral with their growth eg supercars. heres hoping the same thing happens with football and that oneHD puts on a good show.
MV Dave said | January 14th 2010 @ 7:54am | Report comment
Interesting couple of questions posed.
Regarding HAL on FTA it needs some presence and the One HD show is a very small step but…it means that One/Ten have a foot in with football, they may start to cross promote the show, they will gain footage and extra knowledge that can be used on news/sports news shows, they have a show now that can deal with the interest of the WC etc so it may? be the start of a move by One/Ten to have even more football content. HAL needs to be shown on FTA with at least a highlights package and preferably one live game per week…cant see the live game happening in the next tv deal because, if the numbers are correct, Foxsports is willing to give the FFA a massive boost to the coffers but in return for exclusivity. What does the FFA do? Take the money which secures the future of the HAL and all its clubs or take a gamble receive less money but insist on FTA? Personally l would think the next deal should take the money if it came down to a one or the other scenario and then a further 5 years down the track when the league has had time to mature look for live FTA . If they can get the money and FTA Lowy is a genius but sounds difficult.
Regarding the 2nd question on Pay TV take up there are probably several reasons but, going on the BSkyB experience in the UK, the main one is that the 3 most popular sports in the country AFL, NRL and Cricket are all still on FTA. Imagine the uproar if one or more of these went exclusively to pay tv overnight. This happened with the EPL in England and there was uproar but the pay off being the massive increase in tv money which in turn has paid for the EPL to become the defacto international league of football around the world (with LaLiga more recently) and also helped to pay for many of the new grounds and upgrade of stadia in the league. This massive increase in tv money was needed by the EPL at the time in the early 90s. The difference is the main codes here dont need such a massive injection of funds…they get a good price for their games and every one can still see them (most of them) on FTA. Not to say NRL and AFL dont want more money just that they dont have to sell their souls (rights to allow all to see the games) to receive extra. Also in the UK the pub scene is huge with Sky showing games live into pubs for those that dont have Sky at home.
There would be other lesser reasons for the lower pay tv penetration rates in Oz, such as it came here relatively late (compared to other countries), the outdoor culture of this country, cost of paytv and peoples reluctance to pay for something they generally had for free (UK have always had a tv licence fee so people used to paying for tv) being amongst them.
Jeb said | January 14th 2010 @ 8:23am | Report comment
Good points MVD,
re fox money vs fta – the same discussion took place even before the last tv deal. Back then the ffa needed cash so they had no choice. They may not have a choice now either. But if there is any, any possiblity at all that they can squeeze some of their football onto FTA without jepardising the clubs futures, then they need to do it.
whiskeymac said | January 14th 2010 @ 9:46am | Report comment
well said. i shld have read your post before saying the same points above also- sky was made on the back of EPL not “property ladder” or stargate reruns. paytv needs sport to survive. and paytv isnt cheap.
JiMMM said | January 14th 2010 @ 8:15am | Report comment
I think the A League needs 1 game a week Live across most of the country on FTA, but the game needs to be delayed into the market that it is being played in (i.e. if at Lang Park delayed into the south east of Queensland). Should also aim for a regular time slot for this game, doesn’t matter what day as long as it is always the same.
On the whole Pay TV thing I think the reason that there isn’t mass take up of it is because of the inflexibility in the way that you can purchase it. There is a general consensus among people that I know that while there are some channels that they would watch all of the time they are normally in the additional packages that you can purchase (i.e. foxsports), and that having to buy the base package that there isn’t much on there that they would want to watch just makes the whole thing look like a waste of money. So until Foxtel can get that sorted out there wont be a mass take up of pay tv.
For the record that is also the reason that I don’t have pay tv.
Vince said | January 14th 2010 @ 8:27am | Report comment
At the moment the HAL needs the Fox cash more than it needs greater awareness.
In an ideal world you would get both but that isn’t today.
ONE is a good place to start, gradually build up a profile there and in the next deal (ie 5 years from now) that is where you push the FTA barrow hard.
As for cost, I don’t understand the argument as it is not that expensive to get Pay TV as people seem to find $20 a throw for junk food each week and I know which one I would prefer.
Simmo said | January 14th 2010 @ 4:25pm | Report comment
Agreed. I think some HAL fans don’t understand how long it will take to gain a critical mass of committed fans that can underpin FTA’s full backing of a league. We’re quite a way off IMO and success comes through many small incremental steps upward. There will be no revolution.
But that said, the EPL managed its penetration into Australia’s sporting market off several years of late night highlights on the ABC and then SBS. A HAL highlights show on FTA is a good incremental step towards broad-based recognition and acceptance.
Jeb said | January 14th 2010 @ 4:45pm | Report comment
The problem Simmo is that there was revolution but things are now going backwards. FTA would be a massive gamble for everyone involved, but my fear is that without pushing it football won’t be in a better state when the next round of tv deals comes up.
I totally agree that the league is a work in progress like others have said but i definately think there’s an audience for the big games.
OneHD is a great start.
Digital TV - meh said | January 14th 2010 @ 4:55pm | Report comment
Not really true – that maintained a small degree of interest, but EPL only took off in this country because of Foxtel and screening games at 10pm, 11pm etc. on a Saturday night.
Done for 2 reasons. To avoid crowd trouble in England, and also to sell more easily into Asia.
Tom said | January 14th 2010 @ 8:31am | Report comment
The foxsports audience who seek out the A-league are more likely to have an appreciation for the game than the free-to-air audience who would mostly have been exposed to AFL and NRL.
I’m not sure the A-league is really good enough yet for a free-to-air audience to appreciate it on television. The best way to get a non-soccer person to enjoy the A-league is to get them to a game with a decent atmosphere.
MV Dave said | January 14th 2010 @ 8:44am | Report comment
Game quality can certainly be hit or miss and you wouldnt want for eg the CCM vs PG 0-0 from a few weeks back on FTA. However a game like MV v BR 3-3 or GCU v BR 5-1 would be excellent entertainment for the casual fan. Certainly games with guarenteed atmosphere (cant guarentee the game quality) should be put forward for FTA telecast. It may mean the higher drawing teams such as MV or SFC have more time (games) on FTA. Therefore if FTA were to do a game each week there would need to be a flexible schedule so that top of the table games are also included as potential live FTA. With 11 and then 12 teams in the league there should be at least one game that stands out for FTA each week such as derbys and big rivalries, then top of the table games, so games such as MV vs MH, SFC v MV, NJ v CCM, SFC v SR, AU v MV, BR v GCU for starters, would all be games worthy of FTA.