Re: Lenighan blames West Yorkshire mafia
Posted: Fri Jun 29, 2018 4:06 pm
bramleyrhino wrote:
IIRC, Sky approached the RFL with an improved offer ahead of their annual stock exchange statement, having lost rights to other sporting events (I can't remember exactly). Whatever you think of this deal, let's not forget that the clubs voted in favour of this. IL can decry a "noisy opponent" to democracy all he wants, but he was hardly quiet on his views of that democratic process at the time.
But look at the situation objectively and we're probably not in the strong postion that people feel we are. The value of advertising slots around RL content is also lower than other sports for reasons I've suggested and I can't imagine that, proportionately at least, that many subscriptions rely on Super League. Yes, we offer Sky some value, but they're not going to throw more money at us simply because IL, Moran and McMannus are stamping their feet.
For one example, we're one of the only professional sports that actively dillutes its own TV audience by hosting fixtures that compete with our TV fixtures (there are games at Hull, Hull KR and Warrington competing with tonight's televised game at St Helens). If I were Sky, the first thing I would be insisting on is fixture exclusivity on Thurs and Friday nights - and that is something that Lenaghan of all people cannot deliver under Wigan's current arrangement at the DW.
But look at the situation objectively and we're probably not in the strong postion that people feel we are. The value of advertising slots around RL content is also lower than other sports for reasons I've suggested and I can't imagine that, proportionately at least, that many subscriptions rely on Super League. Yes, we offer Sky some value, but they're not going to throw more money at us simply because IL, Moran and McMannus are stamping their feet.
For one example, we're one of the only professional sports that actively dillutes its own TV audience by hosting fixtures that compete with our TV fixtures (there are games at Hull, Hull KR and Warrington competing with tonight's televised game at St Helens). If I were Sky, the first thing I would be insisting on is fixture exclusivity on Thurs and Friday nights - and that is something that Lenaghan of all people cannot deliver under Wigan's current arrangement at the DW.
Don't deny the clubs voted for it, however I think Lenaghans point was that they all voted for it because the RFL were caught completely flat footed, and Sky ran circles around them. Precisely because Sky had just lost rights, they should of been vulnerable, and if the RFL were a step ahead, they could have had offers from the other parties that Sky just lost to already lined up before Sky phoned. Which means Sky couldnt use the now or never and the clubs could have voted without Jeopardy. Elstones job is precisely to stop the clubs being caught flat footed again. Even Turkeys can vote for Christmas when the alternate is worse.
I don't disagree that we as a sport are in a tough spot, others have already said were generally a Type D demographic and that struggles for revenue. Precisely because of that though, the new forms of television, the subscription based one (Netflix, amazon, apple etc) should be the Rugby Leagues best friend. Amazon have proven their desire buying one of the Football packages, which is an absolute loss maker for them - we should have been putting ourselves forwards as guniea pigs for these companies two contracts ago imo. Then the value of advertising matters little. Value is in the strength of the perceived market, not the product itself.
This is partially mitigated in other sports by the sheer quantity available (if you look hard enough you can always find a football match to watch). It would be interesting to see what would happen if all games were available to stream on one of the above platforms and remained on demand for a week following - I know I would probably end up watching most. Retention value in sport has always been one of the biggest blockers for streaming services getting involved. Were a low risk way of optimising the model.
All of this is irrelevant in the grand scheme of things - but there are fairly simple ways that the sport can strengthen itself, so even if Elstone is making it sound "negotiate harder" there will be plans and ideas underlying it.