Premier Sports TV deal

[mozzauk]

The problem is that Premier Sports are a niche Sports TV Platform covering the like of Stock Car racing from Skegness, Gaelic Football and La Liga, as well as the Pro 14 competition, all of which will provide a small amount of subscriptions, or will it go onto FreeSports along with coverage of TimberSports??? 

Lets also remember Premier Sports last covered the championship in 2012 and then covered NRL and Toronto and produced Back Chat... all where dropped if i remember for poor viewer numbers...

Why cant we aim to talk to the likes of BT Sport, Amazon we have an amazing sport, even at Championship and NL1 level, so lets sell it, and not settle for 3rd best....

This in my mind raises a few questions...

Will people really pay £13 a month on top of Sky Sports (if not on FreeSports), for a sub par production, as happened in the past, as Premier Sports usually just take the feed provided by the clubs / venues. 

How will teams support Monday Night Games, with 99% of teams in the Championship and all teams in League 1 being Part-Time, and how will the players cope with possibly 2 games a week, and fitting in work, Is this going to drive away players who love the sport? 

How will teams who play be compensated for playing Monday night? 

How will the broadcasting rights pennies be split between all clubs?? 
How much marketing will Premier Sports do? 

As as been raised above will each team have to give away free tickets again (not that this is a bad idea, to get people in the stadiums).

 

[Dave T]

1 hour ago, Whippet13 said:

If the audience sizes are similar, I'd much rather pay £13pm to OurLeague than to Premier Sports, at least I know where all the profits are going.

I think this is what the game needs to get right. If it is getting no money, and doesn't believe it can monetise a deal through higher sponsorships etc. then OurLeague may be the far better option. You retain full control of schedules, and whilst there is risk associated with carrying costs, it feels like the risk would be minimal. 

[Dave T]

49 minutes ago, mozzauk said:

The problem is that Premier Sports are a niche Sports TV Platform covering the like of Stock Car racing from Skegness, Gaelic Football and La Liga, as well as the Pro 14 competition, all of which will provide a small amount of subscriptions, or will it go onto FreeSports along with coverage of TimberSports??? 

Lets also remember Premier Sports last covered the championship in 2012 and then covered NRL and Toronto and produced Back Chat... all where dropped if i remember for poor viewer numbers...

Why cant we aim to talk to the likes of BT Sport, Amazon we have an amazing sport, even at Championship and NL1 level, so lets sell it, and not settle for 3rd best....

This in my mind raises a few questions...

Will people really pay £13 a month on top of Sky Sports (if not on FreeSports), for a sub par production, as happened in the past, as Premier Sports usually just take the feed provided by the clubs / venues. 

How will teams support Monday Night Games, with 99% of teams in the Championship and all teams in League 1 being Part-Time, and how will the players cope with possibly 2 games a week, and fitting in work, Is this going to drive away players who love the sport? 

How will teams who play be compensated for playing Monday night? 

How will the broadcasting rights pennies be split between all clubs?? 
How much marketing will Premier Sports do? 

As as been raised above will each team have to give away free tickets again (not that this is a bad idea, to get people in the stadiums).

 

I don't think Premier dropped any for bad figures. The rights they had were sold to Sky instead. 

[Scubby]

1 hour ago, Dave T said:

I don't think Premier dropped any for bad figures. The rights they had were sold to Sky instead. 

Yes they will also have the data of the number of subscribers who cancelled when they lost RL.

This is a mistake IMO - Premier Sportspays peanuts and is small time. It should have been a revamped Our League in 2022 with a revenue share option for clubs. Make them masters of their own destiny.

[Dave T]

2 minutes ago, Scubby said:

Yes they will also have the data of the number of subscribers who cancelled when they lost RL.

This is a mistake IMO - Premier Sportspays peanuts and is small time. It should have been a revamped Our League in 2022 with a revenue share option for clubs. Make them masters of their own destiny.

Agreed. We are not in a position to give this for free. The world has moved on, we've spent years developing our own platform. The only way you should give it free is if it gets huge numbers. This deal won't. 

If they pay, great. 

[Scubby]

8 minutes ago, Dave T said:

Agreed. We are not in a position to give this for free. The world has moved on, we've spent years developing our own platform. The only way you should give it free is if it gets huge numbers. This deal won't. 

If they pay, great. 

It looks lazy from where I'm looking and the previous deal did not benefit clubs financially. 

 

[thebrewxi]

Thinking about this again, I suspect Premier would see a tournament below the top 20 teams as  being similar to the scottish semi pro union tournament they broadcast, and I dont believe they pay anything to the SRFU or the clubs for. 

On the positive side however is that theyve agreed that those matches all go on Freesports, and at a decent weekend afternoon spot. So provided they did the same it would be free to air broadcasting that surely is only a good thing, or the next best thing, for the sport and clubs if they are unable to monetize live broadcasting. 

To me this just looks potentially more of a relaunch of the NCL coverage that uses to be on Freesport rather, as the structure will be radically changed by the time this has settled in.

[Jeff Stein]

I had Premier Sports before and quite enjoyed their output, but they were a nightmare to deal with when I decided not to renew when all rugby league coverage ended. I am not sure without something more than just one match a week that it will be worth £13 per month.

Still not convinced by OurLeague. Watched first game for ages last week, but despite having upgraded my broadband, still had issues with buffering throughout the game

[RigbyLuger]

The NCL coverage was awful. If Mick Morgan is involved, you're treating it as a joke.

[Eddie]

On 24/09/2021 at 19:20, Man of Kent said:

Don’t need to, chief. It’s on Freeview (channel 64).

Haven’t watched for a few years but they have definitely upped their game since last time I looked.

They have live La Liga, Major League Soccer and Top 14 French yawn among others. Last time it seemed to be a lot of student sport and Polish speedway.
 

Is this also known as Freesports? If so I’d love to see the championship on that. 

[Eddie]

3 hours ago, mozzauk said:

Why cant we aim to talk to the likes of BT Sport, Amazon we have an amazing sport, even at Championship and NL1 level, so lets sell it, and not settle for 3rd best....

How do you know they haven’t been spoken to? And who is we? 

[Futtocks]

8 minutes ago, Eddie said:

Is this also known as Freesports? If so I’d love to see the championship on that. 

Premier Sports shares ownership of Freesports with La Liga TV. They had plans to go HD on FreeView in 2018, but are still SD.

[theswanmcr]

8 hours ago, mozzauk said:

The problem is that Premier Sports are a niche Sports TV Platform covering the like of Stock Car racing from Skegness, Gaelic Football and La Liga, as well as the Pro 14 competition.

Why cant we aim to talk to the likes of BT Sport, Amazon we have an amazing sport, even at Championship and NL1 level, so lets sell it, and not settle for 3rd best....

We are not just a niche sport but a (predominantly) regional niche sport. And you seriously expect BT etc to pay and show the 2nd/3rd tier of a sport when they’ve shown no real interest in showing the top tier. Batley in RL or Barcelona in La Liga hmm tricky one as which is more popular.

I’m all for shooting for the stars but a bit of realism wouldn’t go amiss.

[Robthegasman]

Hopefully this sounds promising.

And I assume that Premier Sports is a monthly subscription?

 And I assume that I can get it on my iPad?