Channel Seven’s run of covering the Australian summer of tennis will come to an end after 2019, with Channel Nine securing the rights to the Australian Open, as well as all lead-up events, for a five-year period beginning in 2020.
An official announcement is expected on Thursday afternoon, but the Nine Network, who for so long have had cricket as their summer sports headliner, will have exclusive coverage of the Australian Open, as well as the Hopman Cup, Sydney, Brisbane and Hobart Internationals from 2020 to 2024.
BREAKING: The Nine Network and @TennisAustralia have signed a new 5 year TV rights deal. The @AustralianOpen and lead up events to be broadcast exclusively on @wwos – more shortly on @Channel9 with CEO Hugh Marks pic.twitter.com/pHO6g8daYk
— Clint Stanaway (@cstanaway) March 29, 2018
The five-year deal is reportedly worth almost $60 million a year, with Nine blowing Seven out of the water once their exclusive negotiating period ended in March.
The current deal with Tennis Australia is only worth $35 million per year.
Nine chief executive Hugh Marks said in a statement to the Australian Stock Exchange that the network was excited to be covering the tennis from 2020.
“The timing of tennis, and the audience demographics, are a perfect fit with Nine’s audiences and advertisers,” said Marks.
“We are impressed with Tennis Australia’s approach to further growing both its events, particularly the Australian Open, and the associated broadcast proposition in Australia, and are excited to be part of that future.”
Seven have covered the Australian Open since the mid-1970s, but were unable to match the deal put forward by nine for the next five-year deal. Seven, who are Australia’s Olympic Games broadcaster, will cover their final summer of tennis – including all lead-up events – in 2019.
The announcement of the new Australian Open broadcast detail follows a boom for tennis, with all four grand slams set to be shown on free-to-air TV in some capacity in 2018 for the first time in many years.
The new deal for tennis throws the race for the next cricket broadcast rights up in the air. While Nine have covered the cricket for decades, it’s begun to grow stale on the Australian sporting public, with apparent losses being turned over each year on the broadcast agreement.
Cricket Australia were reportedly chasing up to $200 million per year for their next agreement, which begins in the upcoming summer and would cover both international cricket and the ever-popular T20 Big Bash league.
Seven, Nine and Ten, as well as pay-TV broadcaster Fox Sports, are all reported to be interested in the rights for cricket played in Australia, but negotiations have currently been put on hold after the ball tampering incident during the third Test of Australia’s current tour to South Africa.
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