The AFL could announce a new broadcast deal as early as today, believed to be worth $2 billion and covering six years.
The current, $1.25 billion deal began in 2012 and runs until the end of 2016. The new deal would begin in 2017 and will reportedly run through until 2022.
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Channel Seven and Foxtel look set to continue to be the sole broadcasters under the new deal, but the balance is set to swing a little in Foxtel’s favour, with slightly fewer games to be televised on free-to-air TV.
Seven will continue to broadcast a Friday night game, a Saturday night game and a Sunday afternoon game at 3:20pm each week, but it’s believed they will no longer show a Saturday day game, delayed or not.
However, the deal reportedly includes the fixturing of 12 Thursday night games per year. When these occur, they will be broadcasted by Seven.
Seven is also expected to continue broadcasting all finals, public holiday games such as Easter Monday and ANZAC Day, along with special events such as the Brownlow Medal, and will retain exclusive rights to broadcast the grand Final live.
Despite a broadcaster push for the grand final to be shifted to a night game, it is believed that it will continue to be scheduled as a day game under the new deal.
There have not been any reports as to how the new deal might affect streaming services. The only legitimate service currently on offer is through Telstra, and only offers streaming to Android or Apple devices.
A streaming service running to desktop computers, or through Xbox or Playstation would be appreciated by many, but there’s no indication that anything like this will be available just yet.
There have been no reports of Good Friday football being confirmed in the new deal, with the AFL still remaining open to a Good Friday fixture but yet to confirm one.
The deal will inevitably lead to debate in the AFL on how to split the spoils, with the AFL Players Association expected to push for further increases to the salary cap.
It’s believed that negotiations on the new AFL deal increased in pace following the NRL’s announcement of a $925 million deal with Channel Nine for the free-to-air portion of their rights deal.
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Now that was a quick change of mind!
