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Nine signs news cricket deal, buys Adelaide affiliate.

Nine has won the cricket rights and bought Adelaide's WIN affiliate in a stunning double deal.

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imageNine has secured international cricket rights in a new 5 year deal with Cricket Australia.

Under CEO David Gyngell Nine has matched TEN’s audacious deal worth around $500m, creating the biggest deal in cricketing history. But TEN wrests the Big Bash Twenty20 from FOX Sports.

Nine is understood to have signed the deal at 4:10pm this afternoon, 50 minutes before the 5pm deadline.

Nine will pay about $80 million a year, while TEN will pay about $20 million a year for the Big Bash Twenty20 tournament.

Pivotal to Nine’s deal were negotiations with Bruce Gordon for WIN affiliates in Adelaide and Perth. Nine will purchase Adelaide affiliate immediately and after the reach rule is expectedly dropped, the Perth affiliate. That deal is reportedly $350m.

Meanwhile WIN will increase its license fees for Nine content broadcast regionally, helping to offset the increased costs for the cricket. Nine will also save costs by streamlining other departments as a result of the acquisitions. TV Tonight understands WIN has increased its license fees from 33% of revenue to 39%, higher than the 30% Prime pays to Seven.

The outcome, once the reach rule is dropped under the next government, means Nine will become a truly national network, allowing Nine to directly address under-performing stations in Adelaide and Perth.

The cricket deal is not yet formally announced by Cricket Australia, tipped to take place tomorrow. But it is already detailed in media.

Executive Chairman of WIN, Andrew Gordon, has confirmed the sale of Nine Adelaide and the renewal of licenses with Nine.

“WIN, as Australia’s largest commercial television network has never been in better shape and the sale of Channel 9 Adelaide will enable WIN to take advantage of opportunities in a continually evolving media landscape both in Australia and globally,” he said.

“On behalf of the Gordon family, I would like to thank the WIN management team lead by Andrew Lancaster, who have worked diligently over the last few months to provide WIN with a new affiliation agreement that meets our business objectives now and into the future.

“I would also like to take the opportunity to thank Graeme Gilbertson, his management team and staff for ensuring Channel 9 Adelaide has been such a successful part of the WIN Network over the past six years and wish them all the best for the future as they become part of WIN’s long term affiliate partner, Nine Entertainment Co.”

The outcome for Nine, with cricket rights and a new national network, defies observers who thought Nine would lose out after TEN’s mammoth bid.

But WIN billionaire Bruce Gordon may face some tough questions from TEN, after his deal with Nine stopped TEN from landing the cricket rights. Gordon is TEN’s largest shareholder.

This post updates.

Source: news.com.au, smh.com.au

43 Responses

  1. Sigh.. Stuck with 9s boring and outdated coverage for another 5 years. Just like the NRL. I’d be willing to bet there is no clause that they have to broadcast in HD either. And fox sports losing the bbl sucks. They provided excellent coverage and all in beautiful HD. Doubt 10 will air it on one. Seriously what is fox sport doing lately? They seem to be letting a lot of their content go?

  2. No wonder Nine dropped Days Of Our Lives, they were seemingly cutting costs knowing they had to pay a motza to keep the cricket.
    Any word on how long the new Nine/WIN affiliation agreement is for?
    So it seems Southern Cross may have been an unwitting pawn in all the dealings between Nine and WIN?
    Thus WIN viewers look to still have those gawd awful coverup logos spoil their screens on Nine/Go!/GEM programs for a while yet? At least Adelaide viewers may soon get a more professional on-air look, more profressional news presentation, and better program playout with a much clearer picture again which has been looking like youtube quality for the past couple years now. Thats if Nine can take over playout quickly?

  3. I knew Nine would grab it at the last minuter and with less than an hour to go they really went to the edge. I do wonder where they found the money and like that TEN pushed them but still gets a part of the cricket action in coming years.

    I do wonder if this will mean cuts else where to make up the difference since they are now buying the WIN stations.

    PS – I do think there will be a change of government in September.

  6. The poor sales departments will be losing sleep,ten still owes around 9 mill in make goods and heaven knows what Nine will lose over 5 years considering how crickets on the nose apart from ashes series,the last big bash season on fox was pathetic cricket,no spin will fix this business model on either side,if ten are smarting that they screwed 9,fair call,but 100 mill for a crap product bought by ten will just not rate,the game can be over before its begun….Hello!

  8. The biggest winner here is bruce gordon and his win television network locking in nine programming selling the unprofitable adelaide station, the biggest losers are nine and ten. Capital southern cross for missing out on an affiliation with nine and nine for paying way too much for cricket. Now there is no money left at nine for drama or its mega stars pay packets

  9. The reach rule make no sense. Both Conroy and Turnbull are in favour of scrapping them.

    Conroy bungled the reforms trying to rush his reforms through parliament without consultation.

    He failed to consider that Nine’s competitors would try and block Nine from forming a national network by merging with Southern Cross (which may have been just a gambit to force Gordon to give in).

    Or that News and Fairfax would object to government regulation of what they could print and deciding who could own them or not.

    Or that regional interests would be worried about the loss of regional news and other content if it wasn’t guaranteed when the reach restrictions were removed.

  10. Ten didn’t get all that they wanted, but at least they got something. The BBL has the potential to draw a large audience, if it is not doing so yet.

  12. Gordon has had to hand an extra 9% of his revenue from affiliates to Nine, something he has been refusing to do for 5 years. He is paying much more for affiliation than his competitors and is selling Adelaide and agreed to sell Perth. He bought 55% of Perth for $163m in 2007 and now he is selling both Adelaide and Perth for $350m, not a good return.

    And they are pretending they haven’t been shafted.

  13. I have some questions: how long does the new regional affiliation deal with WIN last? One year? Five? Ten? Does it include Nine Perth? Or are they on another rolling contract from next month?

    Pardon the pun, but this could be called a ‘win-WIN’ deal because on one hand Nine Co have massively overpaid WIN Corp for Nine Adelaide ($350 million vs $105 million WIN paid Southern Cross in 2007). However, WIN are now paying Nine 39% in gross ad revenue for affiliation (they were paying up to 35% before), compared to Prime7/GWN7 paying Seven only 30% for theirs.

    But I guess Bruce might be serious about merging WIN & TEN one day if he’s selling his two Channel Nines? In the short-term, Bruce has undermined TEN because of the cricket. Looks like Southern Cross Austereo was nothing but a pawn in Nine & WIN’s power games.

  14. @joey69
    Nine may lose money on the NRL and Cricket. But the idea is that stops their competitors having them and attracts a large audience to the network.

    That means you can promote your shows to them, especially when launching your new lineup for the ratings season, and it keeps people in the habit of watching your network. That flows into higher audiences and advertising rates throughout the year and makes up for the loss.

    In Ten’s deal not all the quoted figures are for cash, they included promotions and contra, and presumably Nine’s offer is similar.

  15. Not that anyone watches it, but I wonder if Adelaide will lose WINs infomercial channel ‘GOLD’ and have it replaced with ‘Extra’ and ‘Extra 2’?

  16. Well the price is obviously good but its a shame to see nine win it again. Was looking forward to something fresh, same feeling I had with the NRL tv rights.

    Look forward to watching the BBL on ten over the summer. Can’t wait to see who they recruit.

  18. I’d never thought I’d see TV Tonight being part of the pro-Abbott media which states that he’s already got the election result in the bag?

    Or maybe I misread “The outcome, once the reach rule is dropped under the next government, means Nine will become a truly national network” – which basically guarantees a Liberal-National government and guarantees that the reach rule will be dropped.

    But, it will be good to see BBL on Ten. Let’s hope they can work out the IPL rights too so we can see our T20 stars in action in India.

    1. Earthquake: Look again, there is no such statement. Even the current govt was looking closely at dropping reach rules but backed off when media changes were whacked and upstaged. The next govt, whichever it is, will likely revisit it. I haven’t tipped any side….

  19. Wow! Where is this money coming from? Can see major sackings at Nine very soon. This is very strange losing money on NRL deal and now cricket. Does not add up. Please explain too me anyone?

  20. Good job indeed by Ten and if they don’t win the TA rights they have a huge chance of renaming themselves the “Home of Motorsport”

  22. Damn, it would have been good to see a change. Just BBL will probably be better for Ten anyway, especially if they don’t wanna go completely belly up by spending a boatload of cash on International Cricket rights.

  25. We have got an alternative option of watching the cricket on Nine or Ten. Either watching international cricket or domestic cricket on Ten. Lets see how Ten will bid for the TA rights

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