A-League strong, but AFL continues TV ratings dominance

12 months ago, when the AFL's TV deal was announced, independent experts expressed concern that the networks - in particular, Seven - had paid too much for the rights to broadcast AFL. After only 6 rounds, it seems the independent experts were correct & the networks are not happy. Source: http://www.heraldsun.com.au/sport/nrl/nrls-much-hyped-1-billion-broadcast-deal-unlikely-to-be-realised/story-e6frfgbo-1226349290817 * Seven, Foxtel & TLS paid too much and are struggling to recoup their investments on AFL broadcast rights. * By far the biggest concern is that Seven, Fox Sports and Telstra have failed to meet the figures they gambled on, and paid for * For example, Telstra paid $37 million for digital rights but so far has managed to attract just 30,000 extra subscriptions * To attract more subscriptions in Vic, SA & WA Fox Sports created a fully dedicated AFL channel which has brought sparkling ratings through existing customers - but not enough new subscriptions to justify the cost.

I think someone has already answered you on this point in another thread - ratings from round to round will fluctuate depending on the games on offer, and this week (and next week) there are no stand out games (except perhaps the Giants vs Suns, which is really saying something). While you focus on round 6, you neglect to notice that round 5 was only marginally below round 1, and overall, still reached 6 million ratings in one round, which is a pretty good number, let me tell you. I'm not going to double check or argue with your ratings figures for the HAL or NRL, except to say that we are talking about 5 games each, compared to 9 games in the AFL, two thirds of which are up against each other, and also broadcast on FTA. NRL will probably have 8 games on Fox next season, and half of them might conflict with each other, and they will then be doing very, very well to maintain the same high average - not saying they won't succeed, but it gets harder the more games you add.

So, the average ratings for AFL on Foxtel this week was under 180k? That's 20% down on the opening round. Do you think this is an aberration or do you expect further decline before it stabilises? NRL's Foxtel ratings started at 260k in Round 1 and were 308k in Round 8! HAL ratings of 60k for the 2012 season are starting to look extremely good ... when you consider Fox paid $120m p.a. for the AFL broadcast rights!

Encouraging to note that for the round just completedy, Gold Coast vs Freo got the 2nd highest ratings of any AFL game, at 235k, although for all 9 games as a whole the Fox ratings dropped below 1.6 million, which is perhaps the lowest figure for a round so far this season (has generaly been around the 1.8 million mark). The significance of the GC vs Freo game is that not only are we talking about two non-Victorian teams, but one of the teams is the a new team from a non-AFL state, and even Freo is the newest of the two WA teams, so it underscores the national scope and presence of the AFL.

Just catching up with the Fox ratings from last week. Wednesday 2 May: 1. AFL: Open Mike, Fox Footy, 91k 3. AFL360, Fox Footy, 76k no other sport Thursday 3 May: 3. AFL: League Teams, Fox Footy, 91k 4. AFL360, Fox Footy, 83k no other sport Sunday 6 May: 1. NRL: Sea Eagles vs Raiders, FS2, 202k 2. AFL: West Coast vs North, Fox Footy, 190k 3. AFL: Carlton vs GWS, Fox Footy, 169k 4. AFL: After the Bounce, Fox Footy, 125k 5. AFL: Port vs Richmond, FS1, 123k 7. EPL: Newcastle vs Man City, FS3, 121k 8. AFL: Pre-game show, Fox Footy, 91k 11. S15: Crusaders vs Reds, FS3, 72k 15. NRL: Pre-game show, FS2, 61k

Very impressive numbers from SkyNZ for Super rugby.

wotdoo Please tell me you're joking? (I'm sure you're not) How reliable is your information? I'm not a statistician but I can't ses how 705 households in Melbourne can accurately reflect the whole population of 4 million!! Thanks for the info.

here is a panel for each of OzTAM’s five metropolitan markets, comprising a total of 3,135 homes: Sydney: 865 homes Melbourne: 705 Brisbane: 615 Adelaide: 475 Perth: 475 this sample size is an absolute pathectic joke

so, based on the sample sizes for Oztam, 3K watching in Adelaide might actually be 3 people in the one household watching it!?!?!? I'm sick of the OzTam extrapolatins - - they desperately need a larger sample size.

How's the decor down at Whitlam Square??

I've tracked the TV ratings across NZ and Australia NRL - Total - 22,198,670 over 7 Rounds Chan 9 - 10,739,000 Fox - 9,208,000 SkyNZ - 2,251,670 Super Rugby (NZ/Aus only) Total - 8,975,917 over 9 rounds Fox - 3,138,330 SkyNZ - 5,837,587 A-League Total - 3,789,210 - Over 25 rounds Fox - 3,503,000 SkyNZ - 286,210 These figures have been sourced and manually recorded from throng.co.nz and tvtonight.com.au and only reflect games which made the top 20 in Australia and the top 5 Programs of the day in New Zealand.

Masters has rewriiten the attached article about Tv rights 20 times over 3 years but this is closer to the truth but not quite there yet..Hopefully he will retire when this deal is done because he acts like the elderly embarrassing pi$$ed uncle in the corner on Offsiders. http://www.smh.com.au/rugby-league/league-news/seven-ready-for-the-kickoff-in-1bn-broadcast-rights-battle-20120427-1xq78.html FIEL Soccer is very popular o/s and the EPL is very popular here. That does not translate into big TV deals esp with the Socceroos on free TV...Seven has overspent on AFL so is un likely to bid for NRL or A league, Nine wouldnt be interested and has no money and Ten is struggling. SBS couldnt afford a new set...

Depends on your workplace. At my workplace the conversation is 100% football - HAL, EPL, Bundesliga, La Liga, UCL, Serie A, SPL, Ligue1, J-League, K-League, MLS, World Cup, etc. etc. Not a single person has any interest in AFL or NRL.

Go to any workplace and there is discussions on AFL footy in the southern states, NRL in the northern. A-League NEVER discussed. Bugger all interest. A-League soccer has got a LONG way to go to command anything more than nominal amounts of tv monies. It is summer 'filler' tv, like re-runs of Growing Pains on Gem or old WSC matches during rain breaks.

AFL ratings on Sydney FTA are up 5% this year

My bad, disregard the above. Got my figures a bit mixed up.

I find ratings figures dubious as well. According to OzTam figures only 26 000 people watched Australia v Germany at the world cup last year. Absurd! While the majority of the population was probably asleep in the wee hours of the morning, no true football fan would have missed Australia's opening match at a world cup unless your job was on the line or your wife was giving birth. Add to that the casual sport fans and patriots who don't follow the game regularly but love the world cup and you're talking hundreds of thousands more likely. But after surveying Mabel of Baulkham Hills, Bruce of Rockhampton and Phil of Essendon they came of with a figure of 26 000.

Ratings or reach? The two are often confused. And if its ratings, Id be delighted to see some sort of documentation to back that assertion.

It does look on the low side, in terms of an average per year, but the $500 mill was actually for 6 years, so it would represent a small increase per annum.

Gallop, Masters et al were predicting the same or more than AFL. Guess NRL continues to be behind.