37 of 42 back IMG’s proposal

[steve oates]

24 minutes ago, Toby Chopra said:

I don't think anyone's saying IMG's involvement will be a guaranteed win. 

Let's see what difference IMG makes over the next two or three years in the areas it specialises in: image, branding, comms, broadcasting etc. Nothing will change overnight, it'll be a gradual process, but if 5 years from now we the sport's revenues are still going down, then we can say it's failed. But until then, let's see what they can do. 

That's a very fair shout Toby and that's why we are not paying a bean up front but are looking for changes we know will take a long time to come about if they ever do come about. The SL club bosses are far too experience and too smart as businessmen to fall for the big sell.  

We should therefore back their approach. Good post mate........

[steve oates]

8 minutes ago, Oxford said:

I don't think they'll fail, I'm convinced they'll make progress in some of the most important areas.......

If you are "convinced" at such an early stage about progress in the "more important areas" how so when they haven't done anything to be measured by??  Your still wishful thinking my friend? Toby says....

"let's see what difference IMG makes over the next two or three years in the areas it specialises in: image, branding, comms, broadcasting etc."

Broadcasting is certainly something major that is not a two or three year thing, as the last of the SKY paid for seasons is upon us. We ned a new TV deal in the here and now, and preferably not a reduced one.... 

This is the main prize, and you can be sure IMG will sink or swim with us on this single issue, not on the other fluff and nonsense. 

[Oxford]

27 minutes ago, steve oates said:

If you are "convinced" at such an early stage about progress in the "more important areas" how so when they haven't done anything to be measured by??  Your still wishful thinking my friend? Toby says....

"let's see what difference IMG makes over the next two or three years in the areas it specialises in: image, branding, comms, broadcasting etc."

Broadcasting is certainly something major that is not a two or three year thing, as the last of the SKY paid for seasons is upon us. We ned a new TV deal in the here and now, and preferably not a reduced one.... 

This is the main prize, and you can be sure IMG will sink or swim with us on this single issue, not on the other fluff and nonsense. 

I didn't say they'd made sufficient or even some progress in fact quite the opposite.

I'm not sure you've read my posts if you think there's anything "wishful" about them.

The Sky deal or a TV deal is not the only issue and IMG will not sink or swim on that alone.

We have two ultimately conflicting standpoints here that IMG know how to bring income streams into a sport (undeniable) and that they'll never have come up against what's facing them in RL's opportunities to progress (just as undeniable).

 

[Toby Chopra]

1 hour ago, steve oates said:

If you are "convinced" at such an early stage about progress in the "more important areas" how so when they haven't done anything to be measured by??  Your still wishful thinking my friend? Toby says....

"let's see what difference IMG makes over the next two or three years in the areas it specialises in: image, branding, comms, broadcasting etc."

Broadcasting is certainly something major that is not a two or three year thing, as the last of the SKY paid for seasons is upon us. We ned a new TV deal in the here and now, and preferably not a reduced one.... 

This is the main prize, and you can be sure IMG will sink or swim with us on this single issue, not on the other fluff and nonsense. 

We are indeed due to a new TV deal, but nobody should expect it to be an improvement on the last one just because IMG are now on board, as there's been no time to improve the underlying interest/perception of the game. 

(The world cup in my view will have solidified interest with our existing audience but won't have significantly expanded interest in the current superleague product) 

My bet/hope is for another two-year transitional deal along the same terms, and then hopefully in 2025 we can come to market with a better proposition. 

[dkw]

1 hour ago, Toby Chopra said:

We are indeed due to a new TV deal, but nobody should expect it to be an improvement on the last one just because IMG are now on board, as there's been no time to improve the underlying interest/perception of the game. 

(The world cup in my view will have solidified interest with our existing audience but won't have significantly expanded interest in the current superleague product) 

My bet/hope is for another two-year transitional deal along the same terms, and then hopefully in 2025 we can come to market with a better proposition. 

I expect the value of the Sky deal to drop fairly significantly unfortunately, but there will be more deals with other platforms for games that could see the entirity of the income drop only slightly. There's a lot of games to choose from each week that aren't televised, these could be shared out. The question then is how it impacts on attendances, and whether any drop is financially worse than the TV money.

[Hull Kingston Bronco]

4 hours ago, steve oates said:

 IMG themselves who went back to the office with their no money without results "contract" (which was more like a cynical ultimatum) after reinventing the useless old grading system we had some seasons back, to what purpose nobody knows. 

 

The purpose is pretty clear: We’re moving to a closed league, with a transitional period. When in place, clubs will only enter the league by invitation in order to add the the number of clubs, as and when they can add value to the comp (measured in a slightly more sophisticated way than “has the local car dealer in some random northern town bought victory in the 2nd tier by outspending the other clubs for one season?”)

You might not like that, but let’s not pretend it isn’t the strategy, or that there isn’t a case to be made for it. It works for the NRL, the NFL, the NHL, the MLS, etc. etc. etc. 

[Hemi4561]

5 hours ago, steve oates said:

That's a very fair shout Toby and that's why we are not paying a bean up front but are looking for changes we know will take a long time to come about if they ever do come about. The SL club bosses are far too experience and too smart as businessmen to fall for the big sell.  

We should therefore back their approach. Good post mate........

These experienced and smart business men whose clubs have survived on large amounts of being doled out to them, curtesy of Murdoch, and even larger amounts of money out of their own pockets. 

IMG will be a "success" insofar as they will come away with more money than they went in with, and even if they don't that will be the price of doing business, they don't have all their eggs in one basket.

Unfortunately RL doesn't have that luxury. 

[Dave T]

3 hours ago, dkw said:

I expect the value of the Sky deal to drop fairly significantly unfortunately, but there will be more deals with other platforms for games that could see the entirity of the income drop only slightly. There's a lot of games to choose from each week that aren't televised, these could be shared out. The question then is how it impacts on attendances, and whether any drop is financially worse than the TV money.

I think that is a risk, absolutely. 

But I think the short term win here is to get Sky to believe that positive times are coming, even if that isn't this year or even next year. 

We have had two huge increases in the history of Sky deals.

The first was the huge one on the back of the creation of SL. When we didn't quite deliver on the promises, we saw a cut deal to give more realistic value. 

The second was based on the Super 8s. Once again, we didn't deliver the promised exciting changes, and in fact went one step worse by driving a horrendously negative narrative for the game. Everyone in the sport has talked RL down since that record deal was announced, and then we ended up with a huge cut. It should be little wonder that Sky saw they could retain us on the cheap. 

If we look at where we are now, we now have some professionals involved, we have hopefully sorted out some governance, we have hopefully whethered Covid in OK shape, we have a C4 deal, and we are now looking at a future which is all about driving up standards of clubs. Broadly the clubs appear to be on board and singing from the name hymn sheet.

I think the narrative is far more positive than in recent years, and hopefully that will be able to reflected in negotiations with Sky being prepared to support the game with a decent longer term deal. They have shown previously that they are prepared to do that. 

[GUBRATS]

21 minutes ago, Dave T said:

I think that is a risk, absolutely. 

But I think the short term win here is to get Sky to believe that positive times are coming, even if that isn't this year or even next year. 

We have had two huge increases in the history of Sky deals.

The first was the huge one on the back of the creation of SL. When we didn't quite deliver on the promises, we saw a cut deal to give more realistic value. 

The second was based on the Super 8s. Once again, we didn't deliver the promised exciting changes, and in fact went one step worse by driving a horrendously negative narrative for the game. Everyone in the sport has talked RL down since that record deal was announced, and then we ended up with a huge cut. It should be little wonder that Sky saw they could retain us on the cheap. 

If we look at where we are now, we now have some professionals involved, we have hopefully sorted out some governance, we have hopefully whethered Covid in OK shape, we have a C4 deal, and we are now looking at a future which is all about driving up standards of clubs. Broadly the clubs appear to be on board and singing from the name hymn sheet.

I think the narrative is far more positive than in recent years, and hopefully that will be able to reflected in negotiations with Sky being prepared to support the game with a decent longer term deal. They have shown previously that they are prepared to do that. 

Dave , you can add a few on here , and not the so called ' flat cap/earth ' ones but the so called super intelligent franchise/licencing lovers who talk down the game at almost every opportunity 

 

[Toby Chopra]

38 minutes ago, Dave T said:

I think that is a risk, absolutely. 

But I think the short term win here is to get Sky to believe that positive times are coming, even if that isn't this year or even next year. 

We have had two huge increases in the history of Sky deals.

The first was the huge one on the back of the creation of SL. When we didn't quite deliver on the promises, we saw a cut deal to give more realistic value. 

The second was based on the Super 8s. Once again, we didn't deliver the promised exciting changes, and in fact went one step worse by driving a horrendously negative narrative for the game. Everyone in the sport has talked RL down since that record deal was announced, and then we ended up with a huge cut. It should be little wonder that Sky saw they could retain us on the cheap. 

If we look at where we are now, we now have some professionals involved, we have hopefully sorted out some governance, we have hopefully whethered Covid in OK shape, we have a C4 deal, and we are now looking at a future which is all about driving up standards of clubs. Broadly the clubs appear to be on board and singing from the name hymn sheet.

I think the narrative is far more positive than in recent years, and hopefully that will be able to reflected in negotiations with Sky being prepared to support the game with a decent longer term deal. They have shown previously that they are prepared to do that. 

That's an overall optimistic take Dave, which I broadly agree with. I tend to think that Sky are unlikely to lift the deal just on the (reasonable) promise of good things to come, but my hope is the positive mood music will be enough for them not to cut it further. And when we can point to some actual tangible benefits next time round, then comes the opportunity to head upwards. 

I also think that whenever we've kicked the numbers around on here we've deduced that the bare minimum value of superleague based on the viewership is about what we're getting now, so there's a risk for Sky we could walk to a rival if they tried to low ball us even more. 

British rugby league is a stable, if limited, sports property, unlike some others we could mention, so I don't think they will. 

[dkw]

46 minutes ago, Dave T said:

I think that is a risk, absolutely. 

But I think the short term win here is to get Sky to believe that positive times are coming, even if that isn't this year or even next year. 

We have had two huge increases in the history of Sky deals.

The first was the huge one on the back of the creation of SL. When we didn't quite deliver on the promises, we saw a cut deal to give more realistic value. 

The second was based on the Super 8s. Once again, we didn't deliver the promised exciting changes, and in fact went one step worse by driving a horrendously negative narrative for the game. Everyone in the sport has talked RL down since that record deal was announced, and then we ended up with a huge cut. It should be little wonder that Sky saw they could retain us on the cheap. 

If we look at where we are now, we now have some professionals involved, we have hopefully sorted out some governance, we have hopefully whethered Covid in OK shape, we have a C4 deal, and we are now looking at a future which is all about driving up standards of clubs. Broadly the clubs appear to be on board and singing from the name hymn sheet.

 

So getting IMG involved is partially about building corporate confidence in partners like Sky, and hopefully major Sponsors?  Fully agree with that, also agree we're not in as bad a state as some are desperate to make out.

[Toby Chopra]

2 hours ago, Hull Kingston Bronco said:

The purpose is pretty clear: We’re moving to a closed league, with a transitional period. When in place, clubs will only enter the league by invitation in order to add the the number of clubs, as and when they can add value to the comp (measured in a slightly more sophisticated way than “has the local car dealer in some random northern town bought victory in the 2nd tier by outspending the other clubs for one season?”)

You might not like that, but let’s not pretend it isn’t the strategy, or that there isn’t a case to be made for it. It works for the NRL, the NFL, the NHL, the MLS, etc. etc. etc. 

What you write is correct only if we agree the "transitional period" could be a decade or more, because that's how long it will take for us to reach 12+ clubs with the strengths of our current elite. And even then, I have my doubts if we'll get there by then, or even at all. For the foreseeable future the gangway will remain open, according to the proposals, and I think that's a good compromise to have reached. 

[DimmestStar]

IMG want to reduce the number of Super League rounds to 22 from (currently) 27.

They also want to increase TV income but with almost a 20% reduction in content I'm struggling to see why SKY or anyone else would not be demanding the opposite. Can anyone explain?

[Tommygilf]

11 minutes ago, DimmestStar said:

IMG want to reduce the number of Super League rounds to 22 from (currently) 27.

They also want to increase TV income but with almost a 20% reduction in content I'm struggling to see why SKY or anyone else would not be demanding the opposite. Can anyone explain?

Sky pay for X number of games a year, the number of rounds they come in doesn't necessarily make a difference, within reason.

[Dave T]

37 minutes ago, Toby Chopra said:

That's an overall optimistic take Dave, which I broadly agree with. I tend to think that Sky are unlikely to lift the deal just on the (reasonable) promise of good things to come, but my hope is the positive mood music will be enough for them not to cut it further. And when we can point to some actual tangible benefits next time round, then comes the opportunity to head upwards. 

I also think that whenever we've kicked the numbers around on here we've deduced that the bare minimum value of superleague based on the viewership is about what we're getting now, so there's a risk for Sky we could walk to a rival if they tried to low ball us even more. 

British rugby league is a stable, if limited, sports property, unlike some others we could mention, so I don't think they will. 

I don't think Sky will just be suckered in based on some positive noises, but as we saw with the S8's deal, they are prepared to invest in something if they feel they can help move things on. They paid a hell of a premium for that deal, and I know it was part of a wider package of sports rights they were snapping up at the time and with BT etc hanging around, but I dont think they ever really needed to go with the level of deal that they did. 

They have paid £40m per year before, and now pay £25m, moving back towards that £40m isn't too outlandish imo, hence the optimism. Especially if we present ourselves as an aspirational sport going places. 

I think your point about reaching such a low value that we could talk to a rival is very relevant. I'm not sure we should accept another deal as low from Sky (apart from maybe a 12m interim deal), and if we could get alternative deals that maybe don't pay as much cash on channels that could elevate us more then it should be considered. 

But none of that should be anywhere near our aim, we should be looking how we achieve record revenues from every stream and leaving no stone unturned to achieve that. 

[Dave T]

8 minutes ago, Tommygilf said:

Sky pay for X number of games a year, the number of rounds they come in doesn't necessarily make a difference, within reason.

I'm not sure that's a fair read. 

Sky having a month less RL per year could absolutely have an effect. 

5 fewer games would see huge reductions in crowds. 

It would see lower sponsorship value. 

It would see lower corporate income. 

Scarcity as a benefit is overstated - there is a reason we see more Fifa World Cup games, more F1 Races etc. 

But I don't believe IMG do want 22 rounds, they have stated they want to expand past 12 teams. 

But if we do cull 5 rounds, we will have to make up millions and millions of quid with whatever is to replace that. 

 

[DimmestStar]

8 minutes ago, Tommygilf said:

Sky pay for X number of games a year, the number of rounds they come in doesn't necessarily make a difference, within reason.

That would require SKY to screen more than the usual 2 games per round to make up for the difference AND pay more for the privilege.

If IMG can pull that one off they really are worth whatever they would be paid.

 

[Tommygilf]

37 minutes ago, Dave T said:

I'm not sure that's a fair read. 

Sky having a month less RL per year could absolutely have an effect. 

5 fewer games would see huge reductions in crowds. 

It would see lower sponsorship value. 

It would see lower corporate income. 

Scarcity as a benefit is overstated - there is a reason we see more Fifa World Cup games, more F1 Races etc. 

But I don't believe IMG do want 22 rounds, they have stated they want to expand past 12 teams. 

But if we do cull 5 rounds, we will have to make up millions and millions of quid with whatever is to replace that. 

 

There's no evidence that 22 rounds need not include bye rounds, an increased number of cup games or another property such that Sky actually don't lose time.

[Tommygilf]

38 minutes ago, DimmestStar said:

That would require SKY to screen more than the usual 2 games per round to make up for the difference AND pay more for the privilege.

If IMG can pull that one off they really are worth whatever they would be paid.

 

See above. I suspect Super League reducing the number of rounds won't be rhe single thing they do in that aspect.

[GUBRATS]

You never know , IMG might convince a broadcaster to pay for lower tier coverage 

[Hull Kingston Bronco]

1 hour ago, Toby Chopra said:

What you write is correct only if we agree the "transitional period" could be a decade or more, because that's how long it will take for us to reach 12+ clubs with the strengths of our current elite. And even then, I have my doubts if we'll get there by then, or even at all. For the foreseeable future the gangway will remain open, according to the proposals, and I think that's a good compromise to have reached. 

Yes, the gangway will remain open, but with tightening criteria for clubs moving up, and less clubs over time in flux as many are permanent members. So even before the end of any transition, that’s a very different competition.

But the really key thing is that instead of focusing on structure, once A/B/C is implemented we can instead focus on improving the actual product, and selling it better. Thats far more important. 

[Rugbyleaguesupporter]

With hindsight, we'd be laughing if RFL kept £10m a year of the last tv deal in bank every year. 

Perfect storm of people throughout the sport running down game and claiming sky deal was rubbish. 

However, we are where we are. 

Tough call I suspect- renew for additional year at £25m or new five year at £30-32m a year I think might be on table. 

Latter roughly coincides with spfl, cricket and f1 rights. 

*no insider knowledge 

[Dave T]

13 hours ago, Tommygilf said:

There's no evidence that 22 rounds need not include bye rounds, an increased number of cup games or another property such that Sky actually don't lose time.

Well of course, there is no evidence of any of this as it is all ideas on a forum, but I'm pretty confident in saying that we won't play 22 games over 27 rounds, with 5 bye rounds. Broadcasters like having the top teams playing the big games regularly. We see this, we have plenty of evidence of it. 

My worry around the talk of 22 games is that we risk losing relevance. 11 guaranteed home games a year is pretty paltry. Take Magic out and one event is gone. RU only have that number because they have a handful of European Cup games, plus domestic Cup, plus internationals and tours. We could easily be talking around 6 to 10 weeks of Rugby less than our most comparable sport, and I don't think we can afford to remove ourselves from the schedules for weeks and weeks. 

[GUBRATS]

12 minutes ago, Dave T said:

Well of course, there is no evidence of any of this as it is all ideas on a forum, but I'm pretty confident in saying that we won't play 22 games over 27 rounds, with 5 bye rounds. Broadcasters like having the top teams playing the big games regularly. We see this, we have plenty of evidence of it. 

My worry around the talk of 22 games is that we risk losing relevance. 11 guaranteed home games a year is pretty paltry. Take Magic out and one event is gone. RU only have that number because they have a handful of European Cup games, plus domestic Cup, plus internationals and tours. We could easily be talking around 6 to 10 weeks of Rugby less than our most comparable sport, and I don't think we can afford to remove ourselves from the schedules for weeks and weeks. 

Yes Dave , but the NFL do it , so it must be right

[Harry Stottle]

Is everyone who is talking up the positivities of a Sky status quo or even a possible increase in the next deal taking into account that when the 5 year £40M per year was agreed upon for 2017 Rupert Murdoch's Fox were in control, then in 2018 the American Company Comcast acquired the Fox shares and it was then in 2021 that under this ownership a 2 year extension for 22/23 with the proviso improve or else was decreased by 37.5% to £25M per year.

Comcast has somewhat changed the presentation of Sky Sports in that time with it's dedicated Channels Sky Premier League, Sky Football, Sky F1, Sky Cricket, Sky Golf, Sky NFL, Sky Darts, Sky Racing and Sky Darts with all the peripheral Britsh Market Sports moved to the non dedicated Channels Sky Arena/Action/Mix so the question is Have we improved enough to warrent any increase or even stay at the same level of £25M a year.

@Dave Tsuggests that IMG's involvement may improve negotiating matters he says "But I think the short term win here is to get Sky to believe that positive times are coming, even if that isn't this year or even next year" , in my opinion an ultimatum was given "Improve or else" and I don't think that we have improved to any degree for Sky to improve their offer, I also think that the Sky negotiators are to long in the tooth to be willing to increase the contract value based purely on speculation they will want to see that improvements have been made not promises that they will be.

 

Edited January 3, 2023 by Harry Stottle