EVERY Super League game will be televised once more in 2026, Rugby League Commercial managing director Rhodri Jones has confirmed.
There were question marks raised over the viability of principal partner Sky Sports picking up the seventh fixture each weekend following the expansion of Super League to 14 teams.
Sky agreed a three-year deal, starting with the 2024 season, to fund the broadcast of every match for the first time.
They previously made clear that they will not increase their rights fee, and the broadcasting giants may lower their offer when the contract expires next season, having already cut its annual fee from £40m to £21.5m since 2021.
Jones insists that the seventh game falls within Sky’s contract, but admits that conversations are ongoing.
“We’re working with Sky on it but it falls within the Sky contract,” Jones said.
“In terms of the production of the game, it will be under the Sky model, in terms of the production and the video referee functionality and all those bits and pieces.
“It’ll look very similar to the other four non-exclusive games, but that’s still an ongoing conversation with Sky.
“Every game will be televised.”
While all fixtures have been televised for the past two years, not all had their own slot without clashing.
And some games will still be played at the same time in 2026, although major efforts have been taken to ensure there are as few clashes as possible.
“There’s been a severe lack of sleep over the last week, trying to work it all out,” Jones continued.
“Where we got to last year, we (typically) had a game on Thursday, two on Friday, two on Saturday, and a Sunday fixture.
“Obviously, we’ve got a seventh fixture this year, so what we’ve tried to avoid is three games going up against each other in any given time slot and we’ve succeeded for the most part on that one.
“There are certain occasions where we effectively break that rule, and that’s down to turnaround times, the following Thursday fixtures, or ground availability and late notice.
“But as much as we can, we have tried to separate all the fixtures out across the weekend.
“There are some Sundays that won’t have Super League, and that’s because we’ve had to make some amendments to the final schedule due to a couple of turnarounds and a couple of ground unavailabilities.
“But in the most part, we’ve tried to spread them out as much as possible.”