Super Rugby reportedly to have a free-to-air presence from 2016

Cool, free to air rugby union! On channel 10! Now the only problem we face is how to keep channel 10 from going bankrupt long enough for them to actually broadcast some matches.

what use is one Sunday morning replay a week all the fans will already know the score. Super Rugby and NRC both need one LIVE! FTA game a week. But the ARU is too broke they've also wasted a lot of money over the years and havent put enough into grassroots and promoting the game.

"It will be the first time Super Rugby has had a presence on free-to-air television since 1996." That's a bit disingenuous, saying the first time it has had a presence on FTA since 96. ch9 had their highlights show in recent year(s?) Before that I'm pretty sure there was one match a week shown on FTA until the early 2000s, on ch7, I think. They kept chopping and changing the timeslot, then killed it off completely. five seconds of research found this: http://www2b.abc.net.au/sport/forum/newposts/1/topic1529.shtm

It's all part of an ongoing "war" between Sky and BT to sign up UK (and Irish) households to their broadband internet services on long term deals. They both seem to think that if they get to a critial mass they will force the other out of the marketplace - they've already forced quite a few smaller players out or absorbed them. The tactic is to buy up as much sports coverage as possible to attract customers and then package up TV and internet deals. As Premier League football is tied up for the next 3 years then they are targetting rugby and other sports and the fight is dirty. A lot of Pro12 teams have BT Sport as their shirt sponsor even though Sky have the rights to that league for example. I worry that it may result in a "false economy" for professional rugby as both firms are paying over what pro-rugby is really worth in order to win the "battle of the internet". It may lead to some bumpy landings when it's all over.

Hi hardcore, yep that makes sense. The french media keep referring to SR teams as the 'Auckland Blues", "Western province stormers", "qld reds" etc, in their very few articles as their readers just need to know where these teams are based, and rightly so. I think 'regionalism' is so important in Europe that any match in any sport is first and foremost a contest between 2 regions, 2 cities etc rather than a game between blue and red jerseys. I think there is a demand for SH exoticism, i.e. 'best tries of the week' etc, but really struggle to think ppl are going to tune it every week to follow the comp (except home sick expats perhaps).

Whilst we would all prefer free to air broadcast of all Super 15 and NRC games, anything is an improvement on what we have now.

Incidentally. yesterday's SMH TV Guide doesn't show Ten broadcasting the Twickers game live on Saturday night, only a replay on the alternate Ten at 6 a.m. This must be a mistake, surely ....

... and don't get me started on the amount of teams that wear predominantly blue either!

I don't think it's a small complaint, although it should have been a small issue that was promptly fixed many years ago. It's one of the unfathomable stupidities of the rugby brains trust that they don't understand that all sport is tribal and local and the establishment of a regional identity is fundamental to building a popular support base. It's likewise unfathomably stupid to have Melbourne and Perth teams mixed up with NSW, Qld and the ACT. So much wrong that is so elementary to fix; so little power to do it!

Good on channel 10 for taking this first step. Hopefully they have a long term vision for their chosen sport as is will take quite a while to unhook people from pay tv. Great news and i hope things can grow from here

Hello Nick, It's similar in the UK, where Superrugby had a brief spell on Sky Sports (it might still be on there, I'm not sure). While some rugby fans were happy to watch any match so tuned in regularly, most weren't too interested after the novelty wore off. I put this down to the teams' lack of identity. Most casual observers had no idea if the Chiefs were from NZ or South Africa, where the Hurricanes were from, or even what a Waratah was meant to represent. Without that sense of regional identity it was difficult for viewers to feel any affinity to the teams. It's probably a small complaint, but I think it does affect viewers' perceptions of the sport.

Are you kidding? I can't hit the remote fast enough when The Blot Report comes on.

With reference to tv coverage generally, it has always seemed to me that the rugby brains trust is astonishingly unimaginative in packaging highlight footage, supinely falling in line with the production values of non-rugby broadcasters. As we all know, the highlight of a match is not necessarily the technical scoring of a try but the ensemble play that leads to a try. This is what generally distinguished rugby from league, in the thrills department anyway. It follows that the best full sequence of play resulting in a try should be the central (and, if time dictates, only) feature of the match summary, omitting if necessary footage that amounts to a single play that results in the perfunctory grounding of the ball over the line for other tries. Highlights should be what the word means.

Lol you could have said you meant 2013. My mistake

Exactly

Rugby was paying for that coverage maybe there isn't enough funds to pay for it and it's likely the NRC will have to fund their own fta deal.

Seriously, this response is shameful. People on this site moan about no fta, get some which was totally unexpected, and complain it's not enough. Just terrible.

Whats priority now is to release regular exciting highlights reel, and game preview packs Take the top sports journalists to lunch weekly and game passes For the ABC, SBS: provide more detailed SR coverage across the season. Starting Jan for pre-season promo.

Actually Brett that's exactly what will happen. The fra highlight show Super Rugby extra time was programmed for 1130 on a weeknight on 9. 7 used to put the test matches - home matches like tri nations - on at 130am .Why would 10 be any different?

No man, it is a domestic comp, why pad it with overseas players? I would like our Currie Cup to be our only domestic comp ad dump Super Rugby, currently our talent is pooled into the Franchises only and if the Currie Cup in its current guise of 8 teams get priority we can spread the talent over 8 teams. The reality is all this jostling by SANZAR isn't ever going to compete with salaries from abroad, so I would be best to simply create a structure best for our rugby, rather than chasing the almighty dollar.