It’s official. After a decade, Channel Ten will walk away from AFL at the conclusion of season 2011.
This isn’t as surprising in itself, as it is for the notion that viewers will no longer be subjected to the innovative, yet despised, final quarter five-minute warning.
Unless, of course, Seven hires a mass of staff from Ten, and implement this tool on their own, exclusive coverage from next season.
Ten pioneered this during their first season of AFL in 2002, and whilst it certainly left viewers on the edge of their seats, many said that they preferred to know exactly how much time was on the clock.
The most notorious instances include the 2002, 2005, 2006 Grand Finals, which were broadcast on Ten, each decided by single-figures (nine, four and one points) respectively, with the ’09 decider only ballooning to twelve points after the siren.
But it has to be said that apart from this minor blemish, which you could even argue is hardly a blemish, Channel Ten have been wonderful custodians of the great game.
Saturdays won’t be quite the same after this season.
Fans keeping their boxes tuned to Ten from the afternoon through to night, with the entertainment of Before the Game in between matches keeping viewers switched on, have only three more months of this arrangement to look forward to.
Then, we better get used to dialling in ‘7’ on remotes for the duration of the weekend for our fix of footy, with Seven now almost certainly the sole custodians of AFL on free-to-air, unless Nine buys in, which is increasingly unlikely.
But we can’t forget, this isn’t the first time that Seven has been in this position. Before 2002, they held exclusive rights to the game for a long, long time.
It will just be odd re-acclimatising, to having the single network screening AFL for the first time in a decade.
And hopefully Seven can brush up a little to the standard we’ve become accustomed with Ten.
Ten’s metioned set-up on Saturdays, is a winner. One would hope that Seven simply adopts their schedule, perhaps even incorporating some of the faces (just not Robert Walls!) we’ve come to know on Ten, into their coverage.
And with live football now a stipulation of the coverage, you’d hope we’ll no longer be subjected to Seven’s four-minute ad breaks between goals (Sunday afternoon football!).
The silver lining of this decision for Ten, is that it opens the door to re-acquire coverage of the ever-expanding V8 Supercars.
They will have a huge hole to fill on Saturday afternoons, which Seven will take care of, so you’d assume that unless the latter wants to show V8s at 2am, or on a secondary channel such as 7mate, which isn’t yet universally accepted, they may have to part with the series.
This means that Ten has a year to cool their heels in 2012, and to position itself well and truly to re-assume the mantle “home of motorsport”, the missing piece being V8 Supercars, from 2013.
And what’s more, Ten has been putting feelers out in recent weeks about their desire to re-enter the NRL fold, having last held the rights in the mid-1990s.
NRL has boomed in popularity on television in recent seasons, so you can’t help but feel that Ten may just be on a winner in sacrificing AFL to buy a slice of NRL alongside V8 Supercars.
At least AFL season 2011 is still far from over, and we have the best part of half a season, plus finals, including the Grand Final in glorious HD one last time, before Ten moves on.
Connar Olsen
Guest
No AFL on Ten as of 2 October 2011, but hopefully the Melbourne Cup as of 2012. I enjoyed Ten's AFL Coverage in those Ten Years but it's time to say Goodbye Forever on the Evening of 1 October 2011.
Kris
Guest
What's the five minute warning thingo?? Never watched AFL.
Epiquin
Guest
Yeh... but NRL doesn't sound right unless its coming from the mouth of Rabs Warren...
JVGO
Guest
This is a totally ridiculous statement re L Murdoch. The $500 mil spent on the SL war was money well spent as it ended with Fox gaining a monopoly on pay TV in Australia, which is basically a license to print money. If you don't think it was worth it remember that there was a rival TV provider Optus TV which happened to own the exclusive rights to the AFL. Once News gained exclusive control of RL funnily enough Optus disappeared. Fox has recouped the SL expenditures many times over.
Jaceman
Guest
Good god - more Tim Watson on seven. Seven had to bid lots because their ratings suffered last time they didnt have AFL and they dont want to get into a bidding war with Nine for the NRL. They can at least trade now. Murdoch was such a league fan that he cost his old man $500m during the Super league war which is why he is no longer in line to run the company (or even in the company) when his old man quits. Ten will go back to being the low cost station and will try to do a deal with Nine to stop them (Ten) bidding against Nine for NRL. They tried the same tactic with Seven for AFL but found the deal too rich...j
TomB
Guest
Finally, somebody who agrees that seven does a good job of the V8's, and i also think that they'll find a way to screen the v8's too. Sunday's would stay the same, as the sunday arvo AFL is meant to start after three o'clock next year. The only problem may be that Ten will offer full live coverage of the V8's and it could also allow the v8's to do some night races in Aus, which would be to good to refuse, but i hope 7 keeps them
Midfielder
Guest
Will be a interesting to see which way 10 go ... I have no idea they may decide to go without a major sport and show second run movies ..
jamesb
Guest
for the nrl, chances are in the next tv deal it could be something like this: Friday Night- 2 games on channel 9 Saturday night- fox shows 3 games Sunday avro- split with 1 game on fox, 1 game on nine Monday night- 1 game channel 10 or One of course if the comp does expand to 18 teams, then perhaps an extra game on sunday, with a viewers choice at 2pm and warriors home game at midday sunday saturday afternoon games you generally wouldn't get big ratings, because some people are at work, kids sport ,or people are out and about etc. Saturday night, people go out. Sure if people get pay, then you expect the ratings to be solid because you have a demographic that got pay tv so they could watch either NRL or AFL on a saturday night At the end of the day, with general tv, the high profile shows stay clear of saturday nights
Bruce
Guest
Maybe Seven paid too much & Ten decided not to make the same mistake.
AC
Guest
TEN was not making any $ out of the AFL deal. They HAD to screen AFL on saturday nights in Sydney when the Swans were playing at the ratings were just aweful. It pulled the whole week down for them. Seven doesnt make money either on the AFL transactgion so maybe TEN was just plain smart. Plus the new CEO of TEN Murdoch is a League Fan. He knows that the big markets of brisbane and sydney and the regional feeds to nsw and Qld which mean another 3 million people mean big dollars. TEN did a good job with its AFL coverage and it means 7mate will now screen AFL in the Northern states rather than TEN. But thats a problem . Seven wanted to on sell the rights for the saturday games because it could at least get some of its $ back. Now how will it do that? Will be interesting now to see the NRL's situation with NINE and TEN.
Zac D
Guest
bye Wallsy!
Brad
Guest
I hope they buy NRL, channel 9 are the worst broadcaster. League needs a broadcaster that wants to invest in the game.
Tom
Guest
So does that mean that 7 will have to show 4 games a week live across all markets? This will hurt the channel seeing the games rate 50k-90k on average in the nsw and qld markets. Ouch..... -- Comment left via The Roar's iPhone app. Download The Roar's iPhone App in the App Store here.
mushi
Guest
Bit tin hat brigade to go all conspiracy theory at the prices Seven were paying
voodoo people
Guest
exact figure depends a bit on when expansion occurs, and wether 7 will go for origin, which from what I've heard they are still interested in. 7 & 10 both want different things from the NRL, and even if they don't get it they may try to force the price 9 pays up, a bit like what happened in AFL a few years ago. I'd expect the NRL to get $900-1000M. Origin is worth $150-200m over 5 years, the Internet rights will spike in value (just like they did for the AFL), PayTV will go up (but how much depends on terms) and unlike AFL, free to air for NRL will go up. I'd tip $950M with expansion in 2014 as most likely, introducing Perth and another South East Queensland side. The NRL is sacrificing around $50-60M by delaying expansion a year, but it is worth it to fix other issues (like scheduling, current club grants).
Matt S
Guest
Murdoch, Rhinehardt, Packer on Ten's board and some think the channel has no money. Ten will bid for a slice of NRL action.
Uncle Bob
Guest
Look at the owners of Ten to know the answer to what sports will be on there. They do not want competition to Fox Sports and are intent on running down the services to push us onto subscription tv. In a generation from now, and maybe earlier if Abbott is elected, the anti-siphoning laws will be altered and more and more stuff will be pushed to pay tv. Lucky some of you clowns voted for the ALP.
JamesP
Guest
I dont see a need why Seven will need to use 7 mate in the southern states. 1 game on Fri night, 1 game on sat arvo, 1 on sat night and 1 on sunday arvo. Simple - its how they used to do it in the 90's.
JamesP
Guest
I doubt it. I heard Ten head of sport David Barham say on radio last night his gut feelign is that Seven will have all the FTA AFL and Nine (who has first and last rights to the NRL) will keep it all. Ten is cash strapped and wont bid on NRL. Nine wont buy any AFL, and Seven now face themselves with 4 AFL games and a massive bill - they will not bid on NRL. My prediction on NRL rights is somewhere between 800m - 1b.
Mark
Guest
Personally, I'm a huge fan of the '5 minute warning'. Not knowing how long is left, in my opinion, adds so much more to the suspense. If your team is a point down and it's at the opposite end of the ground, not knowing there's only 10 seconds left results in much more of a viewing frenzy than knowing there's no chance they can get it to the other end. You can make comparisons to basketball, but the difference with basketball is it's possible to shoot from anywhere on the court, so even with 2 seconds left in the game, it's still anyones game. I will be sad to see it go.