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FOX Cricket channel to launch in new Pay TV deal

Every ball bowled in Australia from October, including exclusive rights to One-Day & Twenty20 internationals.

FOX Sports will launch a dedicated FOX Cricket channel with new sports shows as part of its six year deal with Cricket Australia.

The  Subscription TV company has secured broadcast rights for every ball bowled in Australia from October 2018 – 2024, as the first major deal under the combined Foxtel and FOX Sports, owned by News Corp Australia (65%) & Telstra (35%).

The deal, rumoured to be worth $600m, includes:

  • All men’s international Test matches and women’s internationals (simulcast with Seven)
  • Men’s One-Day and Twenty20 internationals (exclusively)
  • All Big Bash League matches (16 exclusively)
  • 23 Women’s Big Bash League matches (simulcast with Seven)
  • Prime Minister’s XI and the Governor-General’s XI matches along with 13 JLT One-Day Cup matches and the JLT Sheffield Shield Final (exclusively)
  • Allan Border and Belinda Clark Medal (simulcast with Seven)

Seven hails new $450m Cricket deal

The new deal sees some events shift from Free to Air to Subscription TV, but screening uninterrupted and ad-free. FOX Sports has also secured digital rights, promising Live streaming matches.

Foxtel CEO Patrick Delany said, “Starting this summer, FOX Sports Australia will show every ball of every over bowled in Australia delivered with our trademark energy and creativity, on a dedicated new home, FOX Cricket. We will also welcome home the Big Bash League which we created and launched with Cricket Australia in 2011.

“In the same way we revolutionised coverage of the AFL and NRL, we will do the same for cricket. It will be like nothing fans have experienced before. We have the most passionate, creative and innovative teams who are raring to go. Standby for a revolution of energy, quality and commentary.“

Chairman of Foxtel and FOX Sports Siobhan McKenna said, “FOX Sports understands the immense responsibility that comes with being the broadcaster of Australian Test cricket and will take extraordinary care of this privilege. We know Australians love and respect cricket and so do we. No other sport has the special place in Australia’s heart like cricket does. We promise you reverence – and revolution. “

News Corp Australasia executive chairman Michael Miller said, “We are a company of storytellers and committed to telling them in the most engaging, creative and different ways across all News Corp platforms.

“Now is the time for the coverage of cricket to be reinvented and our investment is about telling the story of cricket in a different, new and special way with the quality, expert and contemporary commentary and programming that fans expect.

Cricket Australia CEO James Sutherland said, “We’re very excited about what the future holds with both FOX Sports and the Seven Network. This revolutionary deal will enable increased investment in grassroots cricket through our programs and further developing facilities.”

The FOX Sports / Seven deal jettisons Cricket Australia’s deal with Nine and TEN, both of which expressed disappointment and best wishes to their successors.

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22 Responses

  1. Seven looks like it’s been screwed something severe no longer the home of tennis hijacked by nine not even the home of cricket with most games on pay tV how will it promote its offerings for the new season like it did so well with the tennis sevens revenues will be plummeting with out a stand out sport over summer to promote its new shows .will miss the ODI.

  2. Interesting that Fox will produce it’s own coverage of test cricket and produces it’s own coverage of all NRL games yet simulcasts 7s AFL coverage apart from a pre and post game panel. I wonder why this is?

    1. Fox League don’t produce the Nine games, they just use their feed which doesn’t have their commentators or on-screen graphics. You can tell when they show replays during play as Fox put the replays in a mini box whereas Nine put live play in a mini box.

    1. I too hope this isn’t another case like Fox League which was promised as being a “new channel” but really it replaced Fox Sports 2/502 which ultimately reduced Fox Sports other sports offerings as they went from 5 to 4 non-code specific channels (well technically 9 to 4.5 at the time as Fox Sports More which is half a channel launched at the same time and replaced four Fox Sports feeds). But if it were to replace an existing channel Fox More would be the best option as it has the least impact on other sport offerings.

  3. Well seven can’t technically be the home of cricket when they don’t have everything. I would be happy if they called themselves, the weekend getaway of cricket… now if I want to see all the cricket.. it makes sense to get fox… and if I have fox … why would I watch 7… so it’s a win win for fox… 7 have been duded… and I feel sorry for TEN

    1. I don’t think that will happen. I get Fox Sports during the league season (March – September). Now I have a reason to keep it year round. I’m happy to pay to watch it advert free.

      1. I suspect it will all depend on future tech choices and whether Foxtel continues it’s current Pay TV business plan. With satellite disks replacing set top boxes it will not be long before a Netflix style streamed sports network could be introduced world wide, Mr Murdoch certainly has the resources. Increased subscribers should keep fees low but content will need to be matched to different countries as Netflix does now.

  4. “We will also welcome home the Big Bash League which we created and launched with Cricket Australia in 2011.”

    And then 10 transformed it to what it is now.

    1. Yep. I think Ross Greenwood from channel nine in the press conferences. He asked if the communications minister knew. And there was a major non answer from all of them saying that more cricket would be on free to air television anyway. Despite the fact that it is on the list.

      Tim Worner also said if it wasn’t for the anti siphoning list he wouldn’t be sitting there… that would probably be true.

      1. The anti-siphoning list states Fox can bid for events if they’ve been turned down by FTA 26 weeks out. So theoretically if the first ODI is in mid Oct, and 7 have turned the series down, then Fox can show it. What’s possibly being ignore at this point is that the series hasn’t been made available to the other FTA networks prior to it being given to Fox – but that’s just my guess.

      1. Paul Keating inserted the words “At the Minister’s discretion” into the Act in 1995. The Minister (Mitch Fifield) can decide whether to enforce the anti-siphoning list or not, and in this case he has chosen not to.

        1. It’s not up to the Minister to enforce. It’s up to the ACMA. The anti-siphoning scheme is a condition on the licence of subscription TV broadcasters. So the ACMA can initiate an investigation into a possible breach of licence condition.

          However, the scheme only restricts pay TV from acquiring rights if the rights have not been purchased by a free-to-air network. They can also acquire when the event is automatically delisted 12 weeks before the start of the event (on an event by event basis).

          There is nothing in the scheme that says that the rights have to be offered to and turned down by all FTAs before pay TV can acquire them.
          So, in this case, we know that Seven have acquired all the rights, and have struck a deal to not exclusively show the T20s and ODIs.

          This is all perfectly find under the scheme.

          You can disagree with how the scheme has been set up and be of the…

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