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championship tv ?


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Could the Championship offer something different for sports tv channels . With all these new tv companies hungry to fill air time is it time for the RFL to think outside the box and offer something different . With 14 teams we have 7 games per round or week . If enough money could be gained from various tv deals could these teams go full time ? If not a 14 team league maybe a ten or 12 team championship . We know weekends are packed with live sports ,but what if we moved championship matches to mid week (if a tv deal could be obtained for it ) Live midweek tv championship games Monday , Tuesday and Wednesday nights or early evenings . With kick offs at 7pm or even possibly earlier . With rest of games being played Sundays .

Chief Crazy Eagle

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4 minutes ago, Hela Wigmen said:

Part-time players playing midweek every week? ?

if you took the time to read the post I did say if enough money could be gained from tv deals to help these teams go full time .  

Chief Crazy Eagle

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3 minutes ago, Hela Wigmen said:

I couldn’t stop laughing at that bit tbh. 

true it could be hard work and we may have to reduce the number of teams , but it think it could be do able , plenty of games that would appeal to the average rugby league fan to watch on the tv or go to on a sunny evening .  

Chief Crazy Eagle

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The Championship TV rights are worthless. We know this. Yet people continue to deny it. A brief history lesson:

In the early days of the SL/SKY TV deal, the 2nd tier clubs got money but no coverage. The Northern Ford Premiership (as it was called) demanded the right to make their own deals so negotiated a pay out from the RFL to leave the SKY contract and go their own way. This included a Christmas start to the season. They immediately discovered that no-one was interested in buying the rights from them and they had no coverage for years. Then SKY came back into the picture and took the TV rights - for zero money! - but did pay the production costs. This lasted a few years, until SKY decided it wasn't worth their time or money to cover the competition. The RFL then gave the rights - again, free of charge - to Premier Sports. This lasted a few seasons.

When Nigel Wood negotiated the last TV rights deal, as part of his ludicrous 3x8s competition format, he bundled the SL and Championship rights into one package and set aside some of the money generated for the Championship clubs. If anyone genuinely believes that any money was paid for the Championship then they've got rocks in their head. SKY want SL, they're not interested in the Championship, they essentially got those rights for free as part of the package. Wood then siphoned off some of the money to the lower league clubs to secure their votes and keep him in a job. The SL clubs accepted the deal because they were given 24 hours to decide and most of them needed the £300K up front payment.

Championship TV rights, on their own, are worth nothing.

"Just as we had been Cathars, we were treizistes, men apart."

Jean Roque, Calendrier-revue du Racing-Club Albigeois, 1958-1959

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The problem is with midweek even if the clubs were professional you are then competing for air time with champions league football, Europa league and general league football. They don't regularly submit sky viewing figures but an average of 65,000 people watched Halifax vs Toronto in March 2019 which was on a channel every regular sky sports subscriper had access too. Summer bash usual broadcasted attendance is around the 7,000 mark which is roughly what some League 1/2 soccer clubs get as their regular home attendance realistically I have no idea how they calculate it but it looks closer to 2-3000 in most cases which is conference soccer level. Ultimately the best we could hope for is a pay per view our league channel or sponsorship on YouTube but when you have top tier teams struggling financially the money is never going to filter down 

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How many watched games free on Our League last season, a platform targeted at RL supporters. If the numbers there were low, why would any TV company want to pay to show them.

Outside football, does any other sport get regular, week in, week out coverage below the top division?

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4 minutes ago, Hela Wigmen said:

Why do you think that?

Because IMO televising matches at that level adversly affects attendance levels and doesn't provide enough income to compensate for those losses ?

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3 minutes ago, GUBRATS said:

Because IMO televising matches at that level adversly affects attendance levels and doesn't provide enough income to compensate for those losses ?

Fair enough. Just curious as to what a former director thought on it. 

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2 minutes ago, Hela Wigmen said:

Fair enough. Just curious as to what a former director thought on it. 

The priority for all lower tier clubs is improving attendances , and local community engagement IMO

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10 hours ago, SL17 said:

The priority should be to set out on a new venture as the present/past is stuck in a rut. The game survives in the lower tiers from hand me downs. 

The record needs changing.

Not really sure where you want to go with it ? ?

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