AFL TV RIGHTS - who really cares?

Re: AFL TV RIGHTS - who really cares ?

I care !!! I love both NRL and AFL. I support Knights (I'm from Newcastle) and Collingwood and it is extremely frustration in footy season when there is a crap game of NRL on Friday night and we can't even get a live game on Fox Footy.

Whoever gets the deal, lets get the Friday night game live even if it is on Fox Footy although I prefer free to air so I don't have to walk around to the mother-in-law's!!!

I don't think there is enough coverage of live AFL on either Fox or Free to air.

As for popularity, my teenage daughter and all her friends far prefer AFL 'cause they reckon the players are hotter!!!

AFL is certainly on the rise popularity wise in the northern states and I think we are entitled to better coverage than we have had previously. If we can have 3 back to back NRL games on Fox on a Saturday night, why can't we get 1, 2 or 3 AFL games (yes I KNOW they are longer), but we shouldn't have to wait until darn midnight to see a game. IMHO

Re: AFL TV RIGHTS - who really cares ?

AFL TV RIGHTS - who really cares ? Answer, Kerry Stokes might be having a few thoughts about the implications of this. The Seven chart indicates it has been trading sideways since October, perhaps the average investor might have to care also? Well worth a read.


Stokes stuck between C7 and AFL


10-01-2006
From: The Daily Telegraph


SEVEN Network boss Kerry Stokes could be forced to ditch his $1.1 billion Federal Court action if he wants to sell on AFL games to pay-TV operator Foxtel.

A leading media analyst yesterday said Foxtel could make the Federal Court action against it and its owners a bargaining chip in talks with Seven (sev.ASX:Quote,News), expected to start later this month.

Foxtel and its owners are among 20 parties Mr Stokes is suing over the 2002 collapse of his C7 pay TV channel.

"We believe that Foxtel could broaden AFL rights discussions to extract a settlement of Seven," Goldman Sachs JBWere's Lou Capparelli told clients.

"This would effectively [resolve] the entire matter, eliminating costs and uncertainty," he said in a research note.

In saying last week that it would pay a record $780 million for AFL broadcast rights for five years from 2007, Seven said it would drop the AFL and rights partner Ten (ten.ASX:Quote,News) from the C7 defendant list.

If Mr Stokes loses the case, Seven may have to cover his opponents' legal costs, estimated at $150 million, more than double Seven's profit last year.

Foxtel is jointly owned by Telstra (tls.ASX:Quote,News), News Limited (nws.ASX:Quote,News) and the Packer family's Publishing & Broadcasting Limited (pbl.ASX:Quote,News).

All remain listed as defendants but after the AFL deal, Mr Stokes and his partners at Ten will be desperate to offload some of the cost by doing a deal which would allow a certain number of games to be broadcast by Foxtel.

"We believe that Foxtel is in a good position to extract better terms under the 2007-11 deal than it currently has," Mr Capparelli said in his note to clients.

"We believe that Foxtel might get the opportunity to broadcast live and exclusive games in Sydney and Brisbane on Friday nights and on Sunday early evenings in a 'free to air free' window.

"Foxtel would value such a deal and it would bring down the free to air cost of AFL for Seven and Ten," he said.

"However, we expect that Ten will broadcast matches on a Saturday afternoon, while we expected that Nine would not.

"Consequently, the likely absence of a 'free to air free' window on Saturday afternoons means that Foxtel can justify paying less to Seven and Ten than it would have paid Nine if it did have a marquee Saturday afternoon match."

Seven spokesman Simon Francis said Seven and its opponents in the C7 case would enter mediation talks.

"There's a mediation session in the last week of January, first couple of days in February, and then the case resumes the following week," Mr Francis said yesterday.

He would not comment on scheduling, saying that "the final allocation of matches and scheduling will be determined over the coming months".

The court action has already cost Seven at least $27 million. A settlement before the start of the next financial year on July 1 would lead Mr Capparelli to lift his Seven annual profit forecast by 17 per cent, he said.




from http://www.news.com.au