BBC Sport website

[Eddie]

17 minutes ago, Gerrumonside ref said:

They are there for you to find on the internet Eddie unless you dispute them of course.

I was asking for quantification of what he meant. 

[Gerrumonside ref]

1 hour ago, Gerrumonside ref said:

In comparison to say rugby league’s viewing figures?

I think he’s answered you then in his last post.

[Gerrumonside ref]

2 minutes ago, Eddie said:

I was asking for quantification of what he meant. 

I think he’s covered that in his last post on the subject.

[Gerrumonside ref]

Just now, Johnoco said:

Other sports like cricket and RU were 'exclusively live on a big commercial rival'. It didn't stop the BBC discussing them at length and giving them lots of coverage.  

 I am well aware of RLs own shortcomings and am not afraid to criticise where deserved. But the people who make the decisions about what to push or not are human too and they have their own preferences. And RL has never been one of the favoured BBC sports - that's the reality. Which is why it needs to work harder than it does. 

The BBC are going to cover cricket and rugby union because both are popular.

The BBC still covers Super League, but obviously it would cover it more if it had live Super League content.

Honestly this talk of it not being favoured or people in dark corners denying it is conspiracy nonsense.

[Gerrumonside ref]

Just now, Johnoco said:

No it's not conspiracy, it's blatantly obvious -I only deal in reality. Throwing a scrap like the SL show (broadcast at 3am or something) does not alter that. 

We've discussed this on here numerous times over the years. We don't think there are men in a lab somewhere trying to remove RL but we know it's not one of the favoured sports. Maybe that's warranted? I don't know but I do know it's true.

How is it blatantly obvious that Rugby League is not favoured by the BBC?

They promote and broadcast the Internationals, Challenge Cup matches, Super League highlights, live Super League radio broadcasts etc

They cover news stories on all formats especially the BBC website.

That doesn’t sound like an organisation that has it in for rugby league does it?

[graveyard johnny]

14 minutes ago, Gerrumonside ref said:

How is it blatantly obvious that Rugby League is not favoured by the BBC?

They promote and broadcast the Internationals, Challenge Cup matches, Super League highlights, live Super League radio broadcasts etc

They cover news stories on all formats especially the BBC website.

That doesn’t sound like an organisation that has it in for rugby league does it?

it does on these forums!

[Gerrumonside ref]

Just now, Johnoco said:

You aren't reading what I am am writing. I don't think the BBC 'has it in for RL' at all...I never even hinted at that and what they do cover is usually pretty good. OK? No conspiracy.

But they won't go out of their way to push it beyond their basic obligations. You can acknowledge this without being part of some conspiracy theory sect. 

Give me an example of where they are failing?

[whatmichaelsays]

31 minutes ago, Johnoco said:

You aren't reading what I am am writing. I don't think the BBC 'has it in for RL' at all...I never even hinted at that and what they do cover is usually pretty good. OK? No conspiracy.

But they won't go out of their way to push it beyond their basic obligations. You can acknowledge this without being part of some conspiracy theory sect. 

Because the sport isn't giving them reason to. 

If RL content had amazing traffic and click through stats, they'd cover it. If they had an audience clamouring for that content, they'd cover it. 

Without that, RL has to make it easy for them to write about RL. 

How many players were made available for interview to BBC departments before, during and after the event? How much video content was sent to the BBC? How many quotes, stories and subplots were provided to them? Did Ken Davy go in front of the cameras to talk about what a great weekend it was, or was he in the bar sulking that a French team winning the LLS is not the Brexit he voted for? 

All this stuff is what other sports are getting right. You can't blame the BBC if RL won't do the basics.

[Eddie]

10 minutes ago, whatmichaelsays said:

Because the sport isn't giving them reason to. 

If RL content had amazing traffic and click through stats, they'd cover it. If they had an audience clamouring for that content, they'd cover it. 

Without that, RL has to make it easy for them to write about RL. 

How many players were made available for interview to BBC departments before, during and after the event? How much video content was sent to the BBC? How many quotes, stories and subplots were provided to them? Did Ken Davy go in front of the cameras to talk about what a great weekend it was, or was he in the bar sulking that a French team winning the LLS is not the Brexit he voted for? 

All this stuff is what other sports are getting right. You can't blame the BBC if RL won't do the basics.

How many people are eagerly clicking on a preview of a women’s football game? I know that sport is being picked on on this thread but it has taken over the bbc sports pages as if it’s on an equal footing to the men’s game, yet I have literally never heard anyone mention it in conversation even once, and I don’t believe there is as much public interest as the bbc would have you think. RL has a lot more fans than women’s football or women’s cricket, and more than some of the other men’s sports that they report on such as ice hockey. 

[HawkMan]

This old chestnut about TGG and the beeb. Now roughly I believe the UK has a 60m population,  50 in England,  5 Scotland, 3.5 Wales and 1.5 Northern Ireland.  So let's stick to England, now let's ask how many RL fans are there in England? I'll be generous,  so generous you can call me Mr Generous,  and say 500,000, that's really generous but so be it. 

Thats 1% of 50m, now just counting sports budget,  not overall budget,  do the BBC spend more or less than 1% on RL? What live sports do they have now? Tennis, Athletics,  Snooker and RL are the biggies. No live football except for FA Cup outside of major tournaments,  lots of radio coverage of course. Mustn't forget The Open of course,  but that's just highlights now. So I would say that the BBC spends more than 1% of it's sports budget on RL in a situation where at best 1% are fans, and is therefore blameless regarding any problems RL may have,  QED.

BTW it is a tight call who has more fans, RL or Women's football,  die hard fans probably RL but casual fans probably Women's football as Men footy fans will give it a watch if that's the only football going. I was in a pub at weekend and it was on.

[Eddie]

13 minutes ago, whatmichaelsays said:

Because the sport isn't giving them reason to. 

If RL content had amazing traffic and click through stats, they'd cover it. If they had an audience clamouring for that content, they'd cover it. 

Without that, RL has to make it easy for them to write about RL. 

How many players were made available for interview to BBC departments before, during and after the event? How much video content was sent to the BBC? How many quotes, stories and subplots were provided to them? Did Ken Davy go in front of the cameras to talk about what a great weekend it was, or was he in the bar sulking that a French team winning the LLS is not the Brexit he voted for? 

All this stuff is what other sports are getting right. You can't blame the BBC if RL won't do the basics.

I doubt anyone voting for Brexit didn’t want Catalans to win the LLS because they’re French, that’s just childish. 

[Eddie]

1 minute ago, HawkMan said:

This old chestnut about TGG and the beeb. Now roughly I believe the UK has a 60m population,  50 in England,  5 Scotland, 3.5 Wales and 1.5 Northern Ireland.  So let's stick to England, now let's ask how many RL fans are there in England? I'll be generous,  so generous you can call me Mr Generous,  and say 500,000, that's really generous but so be it. 

Thats 1% of 50m, now just counting sports budget,  not overall budget,  do the BBC spend more or less than 1% on RL? What live sports do they have now? Tennis, Athletics,  Snooker and RL are the biggies. No live football except for FA Cup outside of major tournaments,  lots of radio coverage of course. Mustn't forget The Open of course,  but that's just highlights now. So I would say that the BBC spends more than 1% of it's sports budget on RL in a situation where at best 1% are fans, and is therefore blameless regarding any problems RL may have,  QED.

 

Not a great analogy because your sun assumes that 100% of the population are sports fans and watch sport on tv. It’s probably less than 50%. 

[HawkMan]

12 minutes ago, Eddie said:

Not a great analogy because your sun assumes that 100% of the population are sports fans and watch sport on tv. It’s probably less than 50%. 

So, 500,000 of 25m is 2%. Does the beeb spend 2% of it's sports budget on RL? Yes ....probably. 

Not forgetting the generosity of my initial number of RL fans figure.

[whatmichaelsays]

2 minutes ago, Eddie said:

How many people are eagerly clicking on a preview of a women’s football game? I know that sport is being picked on on this thread but it has taken over the bbc sports pages as if it’s on an equal footing to the men’s game, yet I have literally never heard anyone mention it in conversation even once, and I don’t believe there is as much public interest as the bbc would have you think. RL has a lot more fans than women’s football or women’s cricket, and more than some of the other men’s sports that they report on such as ice hockey. 

I don't know how many people are clicking on women's football content on the BBC site. I suspect the BBC do have stats and those stats must show that women's football content pays its way. 

But even if, for the sake of argument, we assume that WSL content doesn't perform as well as RL, then the disparity in coverage is down to one of two things. Either the WSL is benefitting from some sort of "woke" agenda that women's RL doesn't, or the WSL is earning that coverage by making it easy for the BBC to write about it. 

I know which one I think it is. 

[whatmichaelsays]

2 hours ago, Eddie said:

I doubt anyone voting for Brexit didn’t want Catalans to win the LLS because they’re French, that’s just childish. 

Admittedly, that was mischievous of me.

There must have been some other reason why he looked like James Maloney had just shot his puppy.

[Eddie]

11 minutes ago, HawkMan said:

So, 500,000 of 25m is 2%. Does the beeb spend 2% of it's sports budget on RL? Yes ....probably. 

Not forgetting the generosity of my initial number of RL fans figure.

500k is probably about right I reckon, and it’s nowhere near 50%, and I doubt they spend anywhere near 2% of their sports budget on RL. Gary Lineker alone will cost far more than what they spend on the challenge cup and SL show. 

[HawkMan]

7 minutes ago, Eddie said:

500k is probably about right I reckon, and it’s nowhere near 50%, and I doubt they spend anywhere near 2% of their sports budget on RL. Gary Lineker alone will cost far more than what they spend on the challenge cup and SL show. 

So you agree that 500k is about right,  I don't, but I tossed it into the arena so we'll stick with that, that's 1% of the population of England, add the rest of the UK and it drops lower than 1%. Are you seriously saying that The BBC are NOT giving RL with that fanbase a decent coverage. 

[Scubby]

1 minute ago, Johnoco said:

I think whether RL is hugely popular is almost irrelevant. The point is that with big promotion and a big push, things can *become* popular. 

I can't honestly see that women's football deserves the extensive coverage it gets either but it does.

Watch the crowds for next year's Women's European Championships in the UK. It will exceed what the RLWC achieved in 2013.

We can sit here and decry sports that are growing. It is much easier than trying to grow our own game.

[Damien]

I always think there is an element of truth to what both sides say in the BBC/media debate.

For RL I certainly think the door is half closed when it comes to the media and as a result it needs to work much harder for coverage and column inches. It certainly does not do this and let's itself down in this regard, I think most agree on this. There are almost certainly less influential RL fans to push the cause but again after 100+ years the sport knows this and needs to work harder and should be churning out media and press releases and match reports to make it as easy as possible. 

Other sports such as RU and Cricket undoubtedly have more clout and influence. The old school tie network so to speak. The door is always open for these sports and they take advantage of this well. However they also make it easy for the media and are dab hands at giving the media what they need and the whole wining and dining aspect. 

[Scubby]

12 minutes ago, Johnoco said:

No mate, I want RL to grow itself, I totally agree it's not doing itself any favours. 

But it would be great if we could get a helping hand like the BBC have given women's football. That's not decrying it, it's just acknowledging the reality of things. 

The BBC has agreed to show every single Men's, Women's and Wheelchair RLWC games across all its platforms. International sport makes sense as it has wider appeal. 

The reality is that small northern towns playing each other is less relevant in 2021 than it once was. We were fortunate we provided cheap entertaining sport to the BBC (albeit with cigarette and beer sponsorships) when live sport was scarce.

Back in those halcyon days of Ellery Hanley, Martin Offiah and the 1990s Grandstand games - the likes of T20, The Hundred, Women's Super League, Netball Super League, Premier League Darts, NFL London, RU Premiership, Autumn Internationals, Heineken Cup, Paralympics, Solheim Cup either didn't exist or did not have the funding to create a profile.

[whatmichaelsays]

40 minutes ago, Johnoco said:

You won't find me disagreeing on most of those points. I think RL can - and must- get it's act together. 

But none of this changes the fact that some sports are favoured more than others. That is just the way it is.

It's very much chicken and egg this. RL will not get the clicks or views without being promoted by the BBC....so does this mean there isn't demand? Or that it isn't getting the right push? We'll never know. 

I don't think it is chicken and egg. If we aren't able to command attention naturally, we have to work harder to make it easy for people to give us attention. 

That's why WSL and women's cricket get coverage. Not because they're benefitting from favouritism, but because they're making it easy for publishers to run content about them. 

[Eddie]

50 minutes ago, HawkMan said:

So you agree that 500k is about right,  I don't, but I tossed it into the arena so we'll stick with that, that's 1% of the population of England, add the rest of the UK and it drops lower than 1%. Are you seriously saying that The BBC are NOT giving RL with that fanbase a decent coverage. 

Yes. How many people do you think are into club rugby Union, certainly not double the number that are into League but they get far more than double the coverage. And as I said I also think more people are into RL than the women’s premier league football but we get about 5% of the coverage that they do. 

[Eddie]

10 minutes ago, whatmichaelsays said:

I don't think it is chicken and egg. If we aren't able to command attention naturally, we have to work harder to make it easy for people to give us attention. 

That's why WSL and women's cricket get coverage. Not because they're benefitting from favouritism, but because they're making it easy for publishers to run content about them. 

Partly true, but they are also obviously benefiting from favouritism. 

[Gerrumonside ref]

26 minutes ago, Johnoco said:

Thank you. Acknowledging this situation exists doesn't put you in the tin foil hat brigade, it's just the way it is.

I think you are over simplifying the situation and creating a victim narrative for the sport.

Rugby Union gets more coverage for a number of reasons and the one you’re focused on will play a minor role.

I’ve worked on media sports desks and never once seen this influence dictate coverage in the terms you believe it’s happening.

 

[soulboy]

38 minutes ago, Gerrumonside ref said:

I think you are over simplifying the situation and creating a victim narrative for the sport.

Rugby Union gets more coverage for a number of reasons and the one you’re focused on will play a minor role.

I’ve worked on media sports desks and never once seen this influence dictate coverage in the terms you believe it’s happening.

 

Which ‘ media sports desks ‘ did you work for ?