Nine wants more ads in NRL
Nine says it will expect more places for ad breaks in games if NRL bosses expect to match the hefty rights of the AFL.
- Published by David Knox
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The Nine Network is sending a message to the NRL that it will expect more places for ad breaks in games if sports bosses expect to match the hefty rights of the AFL.
Nine CEO David Gyngell says the AFL offers broadcasters more commercial breaks.
“We’ve got to be comparing apples to apples if everyone is going to put pressure on the NRL to get the big numbers. If we are talking about big money then it needs to be more commercial for free-to-air.
“You look at scrums and goal-line drop-outs … we only need 15-second grabs.”
But he is mindful such moves would anger fans.
“You need to look at everything without damaging an incredible product,” he said.
“We are looking for subtleties that buy us a couple of minutes. A couple of minutes per hour could work out to $50,000 more (in ad revenue) per game.”
Meanwhile NRL officials are contemplating offering exclusive coverage of all eight weekly games to the three free-to-air TV networks from 2013, fearing that Foxtel may undervalue the broadcast rights, after it shelled out a record $650 million to cover AFL for five years.
NRL boss David Gallop will put forward changes including switching State of Origin to Monday night, scrapping City-Country and playing Test matches after the NRL season.
Nine is expected to bid fiercly to retain the rights to the NRL.
“This is going to be an extraordinary time for rugby league if we get it right. We will be paying extra money,” Gygnell said.
“But we have to get it right (otherwise) the AFL will kill us.”
Source: Herald Sun, smh.com.au
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30 Responses
fox will make a big bid for the rights for the nrl. no way will they just let this and i wouldn’t be surprised if they offered up a dedicated league channel like with the afl. as for 9, all they will have to is match what ever 7 and 10 throw at the rights and they will get them
The answer for more adverts would have to culminate in NRL matches being played over 4 quarters rather than the 2 halves.
In actual “real” time on the field both AFL and NRL are 80 minute matches.
While traditionalist will protest the move to Quarters in NRL, it would without a doubt make the matches so much more of a spectacle.
For venues it would mean more Food and Drink turnover, for Advertisers more air time, for those watching it at home a chance to go and spend some time with the wife and kids between the breaks.
In fact come to think of it making NRL 4 quarters could invigorate Australia as a whole. It could even help lower child delinquency rates, divorce rates, increase birth rates. The spin-offs are immense.
With more people watching NRL than AFL in Australia a 4 Quarter NRL package would have to exceed the 1Billion paid by Seven for the AFL.
AFL is a better game simple as that ;). NRL do not give enuf to there broadcasters and the AFL do. If the AFL keeps going the way it going in the next 20 years you will see the End of NRL in Australia and thank god what a bad game.
SOO on a Monday night?? Don’t be daft!
How can channel 9 afford to pay big bucks when they are in Huge Debt ,whatever they pay itll be overpriced and i cant see them making money on it. Not to mention it has 1 game a week live on friday nights , delayed on sunday to run into the news and the list goes on and on.and it will be in SD anyway.
I hope in the new NRL Rights, that Friday Night Games shown live are widespread across Australia and we get a dedicated League Channel to show it. Especially when the Melbourne Storm play on Friday Nights.
Doesn’t 9 wonder why the majority of fans don’t want them to have the coverage?
More ads requires more scoring opportunities. Just make it the same number of points for a field goal as it is for a try and hire a couple of AFL “punters” and there’ll be plenty of breaks for ads.
I thought the NRL were trying to speed the game up? Wasn’t that one of the Super League mantras. But now David ‘No one goes to a Roosters game anyway’ Gyngell & David ‘News Lmtd puppet’ Gallop want to slow it down. Like Gridiron aye. Fascinating live….Not!
How about this as a solution. Whenever a ball goes out a streaker with a David Gallop or Gyngell mask runs onto the field and the security get to chase them and then smash them to the ground. The crowd at the ground are happy; 9 go to a commercial break so they’re happy; subsequently the NRL are happy. Perfect solution 🙂
Why stop at additional ads? How about guest commentators (Shelley Craft, Jules Lund, Scott Cam, hell, even Richard Wilkins), a great way for a bit of program cross promotion.
@ M1tch despite channel 9 having two NRL games every Friday night that rates well, it is still beaten by Seven in the overall nightly shares. It’s not Nine that want to pay more for the NRL, but the NRL wanting Nine to pay more to cover it. To cover the increased costs, it has to come from somewhere–therefore more ads.
@ Frankie, even though Live AFL doesn’t guarantee ad breaks during a low scoring game it still has more opportunities in a broadcast to go to ad breaks, as the game is split into 4 quarters and even the lowest of scoring games these days have a minimum of 16-20 scored between the two sides (16-20 30 second ad breaks)
Simply put– if the NRL is wanting more money, it has to give more opportunites for the winning broadcaster to make the money back.
More ads? As if Nine isn’t already giving us enough. I really hope Nine lose the rights entirely because they have screwed enough with the NRL and it’s time someone else has them. The last couple of weeks all games of NRL have been delayed on Nine! It’s about time it changes.
More ad’s should be fine, just like racing, NRL is just there to support the betting industry isn’t it?
Don’t give the right to Nine. Give it to Channel Ten/ONE. I’m sure they’ll show it at a decent time in Adelaide and not fill it full of ads. Even when Nine can show the matches live on Go/Gem i have absolutely no doubt they won’t do it. The idiot i spoke to at Nine Adelaide indicated as much. And when i contacted the NRL their response sounded like they’re seriously sick of Nine’s treatment in Adelaide too. So bit of hope Nine won’t get the rights.
finally some common sense – people have such an emotional attachment to their particular football code. NRL is a valuable product and will get a record broadcast deal even if there isn’t any more advertising. The difference in commercial breaks is huge between NRL and AFL. Also AFL games do go a lot longer with 4 quarters and large breaks between a lot of goals.
We all know at the end of the day, after all the threats and bargaining there will a package for Foxtel and Nine. The broadcast agreement will be significantly less in total figures than AFL because games don’t last as long and there is a huge discrepancy in the amount of commercials and how long they last.
The price per 15sec block of a commercial during an NRL game would be much higher than AFL I would think given that there are not as many.
I wonder how Soccer is able to draw significant revenue given it has very limited opportunities to advertise. Soccer therefore is a better fit with pay tv because of the lack of oppportunity for commercial breaks.
Great idea. There are too few ads on Channel 9 at the moment.
In fact, all 9 content should be shrunk to a small box on the bottom left of the screen and showed as an unobtrusive adjunct to non-stop ads.
The enclosed content can be interrupted with 15-minute station ID and cross-promotional, revenue-neutral ads.
“NRL officials are contemplating offering exclusive coverage of all eight weekly games to the three free-to-air TV networks from 2013”
If this happens the NRL may again find itself in a war with a new rival code, run by New Corp and Foxtel.
There’s no guarantee of ad breaks in live AFL matches either.
Huh? 9 gets 4 hours of rugby league on a friday night which rates well and yet they wont pay more unless more ads are in
Well that will be the end of foxtel. Once again us fans will suffer at the mercy of stupid networks who will delay coverage and fill it with ads! Every fan deserves the right to live coverage of their team every week. To not provide this right is just pure contempt and plain useless in thus day and age.
Yet another reason for PayTV!
During any sport now we’re seeing ads all the time, and not just the ad breaks on TV, the players are walking billboards, the banners around the grounds, the games just their to distract the fans. Most other sports are no different IMO.
I hope ch9 loses the rights to the NRL due to their constant abusing the rights to the NRL Games..
Eight nrl games on free to air would be the best thing ever.
I wouldn’t mind short breaks during scrums and so on, it’s not like watching the players stand around and wait for the ref to blow the whistle is unmissable TV. The problem is this would mean less time for replays showing why a scrum or dropout or whatever has been awarded, which can be helpful at times. But it’s not really a big deal.
They will? Think they already have killed you mate!