Re: Sky season preview ? : Tue Feb 02, 2016 6:16 pm  

Andy Gilder wrote:

Fans of minority sport upset at being treated like a minority sport shocker.

Sky Sports IS football. Always has been. RL was a handy little space filler in the summer months, but the growth of interest in T20 cricket means Sky really don't need it any more. They could put live T20 games on Thursday and Friday nights instead to fill the space.

RL needs Sky a hell of a lot more than Sky needs RL. Sad, but that's the way it is.

No it's fans of a mid-sized sport getting upset at the lack of importance given to the sport they support.
RL doesn't necessarily need Sky, it just needs a broadcaster to pay as much (or close to) as Sky does. As mentioned we get virtually nothing else from them other than the live coverage so it doesn't make much difference if RL was on Sky or BT, for instance, if we don't get the backup of Sky's network such as ad's or references on Sky News.

Plus, aren't all sports minority sports?

Re: Sky season preview ? : Tue Feb 02, 2016 6:37 pm  

Him wrote:

No it's fans of a mid-sized sport getting upset at the lack of importance given to the sport they support.
RL doesn't necessarily need Sky, it just needs a broadcaster to pay as much (or close to) as Sky does. As mentioned we get virtually nothing else from them other than the live coverage so it doesn't make much difference if RL was on Sky or BT, for instance, if we don't get the backup of Sky's network such as ad's or references on Sky News.

Plus, aren't all sports minority sports?

I am glad that sky has rugby league or living were i do now i would not see much of the game and its the only sport i watch on tv and were else can you get 2 or more games a week for what they charge a month for the sports channel

Re: Sky season preview ? : Tue Feb 02, 2016 7:16 pm  

Andy Gilder wrote:

Fans of minority sport upset at being treated like a minority sport shocker.

Sky Sports IS football. Always has been. RL was a handy little space filler in the summer months, but the growth of interest in T20 cricket means Sky really don't need it any more. They could put live T20 games on Thursday and Friday nights instead to fill the space.

RL needs Sky a hell of a lot more than Sky needs RL. Sad, but that's the way it is.

RL outrates T20 cricket though.

Rugby League isn't a huge sport, but it is a significant one. It's hard to measure incremental revenues from covering or not covering one sport, of course, but Rugby League more than holds its own and Sky certainly get more in than they pay out for rights and coverage costs, otherwise they wouldn't be interested.

Boots 'n all was a joke but I do miss Backchat and SL Super Men which brought genuine discussion of the game and consideration of its (recent) history - they are the sort of supporting acts that the RFL should insist on as part of their negotiations. But that's a relatively minor consideration and, for the certainty and the money involved, the deal the RFL did remains a pretty good one in my view.

Re: Sky season preview ? : Wed Feb 03, 2016 1:58 am  

Andy Gilder wrote:

Fans of minority sport upset at being treated like a minority sport shocker.

Sky Sports IS football. Always has been. RL was a handy little space filler in the summer months, but the growth of interest in T20 cricket means Sky really don't need it any more. They could put live T20 games on Thursday and Friday nights instead to fill the space.

RL needs Sky a hell of a lot more than Sky needs RL. Sad, but that's the way it is.

No, RL is not a minority sport, it's the second highest rating domestic sport in the UK. Or at least it was until Sky sabotaged the ratings by bumping the sport to an awful, derisory timeslot that suits no one, intentionally (IMO) providing awful content and virtually washing their hands of any type of promotion or additional coverage which they afford to almost all the other sports they show.

FYI, RL was the only sport covered by Sky that didn't have a "Your home of.." marketing campaign when they were running them in 2014 and last year. They had "Your home of netball", "Your home of women's golf", "Your home of rugby union" (despite the fact that the only RU rights they hold are for obscure European club matches) but no mention of RL, the sport that they have broadcast consistently for over 20 years.

The downturn in coverage (and the upturn in coverage of other sports like American Football and Scottish football) seemed to start in 2013 around the same time that BSkyB and Sky Sports were merged and restructured, and it seems obvious to me that whoever has come in has at best no interest in RL, and at worst an active dislike for the sport. I really hope the rumours about international matches moving to Sky in 2017 are not true.

Re: Sky season preview ? : Wed Feb 03, 2016 9:52 am  

Thursday 'big' kick off starts at 7pm on Sky so I guess that'll be the 'preview' then other other sky broadcast will start 2 mins before kick off.

Re: Sky season preview ? : Wed Feb 03, 2016 1:01 pm  

Just a quick question....

If RL is such a big draw, and if it is the second biggest televised sport then why would SKY not show more of the things you mention.

My opinion is that not even big rugby league fans watched boots and all or backchat. Most of us just watch the games which there are now more of. The games on a Thursday night are extra, we now get all catalan home games.

I can't imagine BT would give us any better coverage and they have a lower subscription base anyway. SKY is available to a wider audience than any other broadcaster that wanted RL. I really can't see what options the RFL had on this.

Re: Sky season preview ? : Wed Feb 03, 2016 1:55 pm  

There is a season preview on Sky On Demand, as well as a documentary on Jamie Peacock.

Re: Sky season preview ? : Wed Feb 03, 2016 2:05 pm  

barham red wrote:

Just a quick question....

If RL is such a big draw, and if it is the second biggest televised sport then why would SKY not show more of the things you mention.

Because volume is only one part of the equation.

The quality of audience is also a massive factor and it's no secret that RL struggles to attract the types of audiences that many advertisers, particularly premium brands, want to pay good money to reach. Whilst that isn't to say that the sport should discourage that sort of support, it's a failure of marketing (particularly at club level) that the game doesn't attract more of a premium audience to supplement what we currently have.

Sports like football, rugby union, cricket and (I suspect) NFL are more effective at gaining those audiences. That brings in advertising revenue, and that tends to guide TV companies on what they provide coverage for.

Re: Sky season preview ? : Wed Feb 03, 2016 9:11 pm  

bramleyrhino wrote:

Because volume is only one part of the equation.

The quality of audience is also a massive factor and it's no secret that RL struggles to attract the types of audiences that many advertisers, particularly premium brands, want to pay good money to reach. Whilst that isn't to say that the sport should discourage that sort of support, it's a failure of marketing (particularly at club level) that the game doesn't attract more of a premium audience to supplement what we currently have.

Sports like football, rugby union, cricket and (I suspect) NFL are more effective at gaining those audiences. That brings in advertising revenue, and that tends to guide TV companies on what they provide coverage for.

'quality of audience'... what an appalling way to talk about human beings.

Re: Sky season preview ? : Wed Feb 03, 2016 9:48 pm  

JonB95 wrote:

'quality of audience'... what an appalling way to talk about human beings.

I agree, but unfortunately boards of marketing & media companies will be talking in these terms, albeit not using that exact language - they use "demographics", but it amounts to the same line of thinking.