Rugby League Australia most popular sport?

[Anita Bath]

5 hours ago, Sports Prophet said:

The one thing that needs to be remembered with tv stats is:

1. Total viewers are dramatically less likely to be unique viewers than physical attendees.

2. AFL have many fixtures that overlap each other. This means on many occasions, there will be two fixtures on at one time. This reducing the opportunity for “repeat” viewers like League which only ever has one fixture playing at any one time.

Other stats favouring AFL that are not brought to attention in the article include the Sydney Swans being the biggest sports club in NSW. Brisbane Bears attendances rival the Broncos in a successful season. Melbourne Storm could not deliver similarly favourable stats as a one city club in non heartland territory.

AFL also commands sensationally more corporate investment than League, demonstrating itself to have more influence over the behaviours, lifestyle and spending of its fans. The larger worth of the tv contracts will attest to that.

The post is a good one and NRL has dramatically closed the gap on AFL, but in my opinion, Australian Rules is still the nation’s #1.

Brisbane bears? There is North Sydney (Gods team) and Burleigh but no Brisbane Bears…you mean the Lions.

[Sports Prophet]

3 hours ago, Young Blood said:

Swans are biggest in terms of members but not tv viewers or money generated also goes to point afl better seen live , NRL better on tv.  it’s insane . Article talks about popularity not passion or makes most money the difference of 23m is overwhelming

Swans is just one example across a number of points I was making. My point stands correct though. The Swans are the biggest sports club in NSW. Financially and by membership.

To your TV point, let me ask it this way… if in one week of 8 NRL games delivered national viewing figures of 1,000,000 (1m) and 9 AFL games, delivered national viewing figures of 900,000 (900k), which sport had the most number of televised viewers over the course of that weekend?

Before you answer, using me as a case study, those viewing figures include myself watching one of those 9 AFL games while I also watched four of those 8 NRL games.

[Copa]

7 hours ago, Pulga said:

Let's not forget that this article didn't even count that one club isn't in the same country and their viewership isn't counted in this. So it's AFL's 18 clubs V NRL's 15 Aussie clubs.

The Melbourne Storm are a the second most attended rugby club (either code) in the world. They're doing just fine.

… and possibly the most supported rugby club (either code) in the world plays in the Queensland Cup and is based in PNG.

[MrPosh]

Surely it's cricket, isn't it?

The only frontline, national sport.

(Admittedly, I didn't read the article and am just answering the question).

[Sports Prophet]

7 minutes ago, MrPosh said:

Surely it's cricket, isn't it?

The only frontline, national sport.

(Admittedly, I didn't read the article and am just answering the question).

Many would agree on that very basis.

[Hull Kingston Bronco]

3 hours ago, Sports Prophet said:

Swans is just one example across a number of points I was making. My point stands correct though. The Swans are the biggest sports club in NSW. Financially and by membership.

To your TV point, let me ask it this way… if in one week of 8 NRL games delivered national viewing figures of 1,000,000 (1m) and 9 AFL games, delivered national viewing figures of 900,000 (900k), which sport had the most number of televised viewers over the course of that weekend?

Before you answer, using me as a case study, those viewing figures include myself watching one of those 9 AFL games while I also watched four of those 8 NRL games.

I’m sorry, but your concept of “NRL viewers watch more matches per round than AFL viewers, therefore there are more unique AFL viewers” has no basis in data. There’s nothing to suggest rugby league fans have a greater propensity to watch multiple games. Without it, the only point of suggesting this is to cover for an AFL weakness in the metrics. 

With a sample size this large, it’s clear that NRL has a far greater TV audience than AFL. It’s not even close. 

[Young Blood]

3 hours ago, Sports Prophet said:

Swans is just one example across a number of points I was making. My point stands correct though. The Swans are the biggest sports club in NSW. Financially and by membership.

To your TV point, let me ask it this way… if in one week of 8 NRL games delivered national viewing figures of 1,000,000 (1m) and 9 AFL games, delivered national viewing figures of 900,000 (900k), which sport had the most number of televised viewers over the course of that weekend?

Before you answer, using me as a case study, those viewing figures include myself watching one of those 9 AFL games while I also watched four of those 8 NRL games.

Swans do not make more money then Parramatta or Penrith or Souths. 

My friend your missing the point the example you gave will indicate afl had more viewers however that is not reality as nrl had more viewers total with less games. How can you defend that millions of. More. Viewers with less games. 

Btw how u watch 9 afl games as you said they overlap each other according to you ? 

[redjonn]

Having read the passionate discussion on here I read the article.    It seems a reasonable researched and thoughtful comment.   I think the conclusions capture the situation best.

Rugby league is Australia’s most popular TV sport, drawing in more people than any other. Rugby league’s State of Origin is also one of the country’s biggest spectacles.

I am not sure you can then say because its viewership stats show its watched more that its the most popular sport. Although it does add to the evidence. Although why would TV companies give better deals to the AFL if they didn't think it was worth more due to its popularity through attendance and membership and hence maybe they think its more popular overall and worth more. 

 

[Exiled Wiganer]

Biggest in Oz, and by far the biggest sport across the region. Which is as it should be.

[Sports Prophet]

1 hour ago, Young Blood said:

Swans do not make more money then Parramatta or Penrith or Souths. 

My friend your missing the point the example you gave will indicate afl had more viewers however that is not reality as nrl had more viewers total with less games. How can you defend that millions of. More. Viewers with less games. 

Btw how u watch 9 afl games as you said they overlap each other according to you ? 

1. I never said I watch 9 afl games???

2. Swans make a mint compared to Parramatta, Souths and Penrith.

3. I am not suggesting NRL had more or less viewers than AFL, I am just saying that if the tv figures say there were 1m viewers of RL over the weekend, that does not mean 1m people watch RL over the weekend.

[Sports Prophet]

1 hour ago, Hull Kingston Bronco said:

I’m sorry, but your concept of “NRL viewers watch more matches per round than AFL viewers, therefore there are more unique AFL viewers” has no basis in data. There’s nothing to suggest rugby league fans have a greater propensity to watch multiple games. Without it, the only point of suggesting this is to cover for an AFL weakness in the metrics. 

With a sample size this large, it’s clear that NRL has a far greater TV audience than AFL. It’s not even close. 

There is a very simple reason why Foxtel… ahem… the NRL don’t fixture multiple games at any one time. Super Saturday is devised by the media giant in order to duplicate eyeballs to fixtures.

Neither does Foxtel have the same influence over the scheduling of rounds and start times of the AFL, that it does of the NRL.

I never came as far to say that there are more individual viewers of AFL than NRL, what I am saying is the figures we have been presented do not give us an accurate answer one way or the other. It will be a very close result either way.

For what it is worth, having witnessed first hand how NRL and AFL is consumed in my profession and as a supporter of both sports, in multiple states (Qld, NSW, Vic and WA), my experience tells me AFL holds a broader media, larger supporter and wealthier financial interest. Without doubt, AFL is the better resources, but that’s not the topic.

Edited December 7, 2022 by Sports Prophet

[Big Picture]

15 hours ago, hw88 said:

Was in WA a few years ago and watched South Fremantle v Peel Panthers(?). The final quarter seemed to be of indeterminate length - anyone know why? It would have been useful to have had a telescope for when the action was on the far side of the field!

It's because Aussies Rules has always added time for stoppages in play and nowadays does so for all stoppages.  If you watch an AFL match, you can see that the clock stops when the ball is out of bounds or points are scored and remains stopped until the restart of play.  The more time taken up by stoppages, the more elapsed time each quarter will last.

13 hours ago, Pulga said:

Let's not forget that this article didn't even count that one club isn't in the same country and their viewership isn't counted in this. So it's AFL's 18 clubs V NRL's 15 Aussie clubs.

The Melbourne Storm are a the second most attended rugby club (either code) in the world. They're doing just fine.

The higher TV deal is because Peter V'landys is a complete puppet and also an AFL game is longer and container 3 breaks for advertisers.

The AFL's TV partners squeeze one 30-second ad into the time between a goal being kicked and the ensuing centre bounce too and because the clock remains stopped until the resumption of play the audience doesn't miss any ot the action, over time the AFL has made their matches very TV-friendly.  That's how they can get more for their TV rights despite having a smaller audience.  For the NRL to get more than the AFL does it would need to accommodate more ads without the audience having to miss the restart of play.

[Young Blood]

1 hour ago, Sports Prophet said:

1. I never said I watch 9 afl games???

2. Swans make a mint compared to Parramatta, Souths and Penrith.

3. I am not suggesting NRL had more or less viewers than AFL, I am just saying that if the tv figures say there were 1m viewers of RL over the weekend, that does not mean 1m people watch RL over the weekend.

That super Saturday is from 3-9:30pm I don't think many people are going to watch 6.5 hours straight they just tune it to Their team.  Even Friday 6-10pm most people I know are so busy to see Evry game. 

Swans made a net profit of 50k while Eels made over 3m so not sure about swans being biggest. 

NSW and QLD hold 55% Australia population so it's not surprising rugby league is Australia's most popular sport 

[Dunbar]

13 hours ago, Sports Prophet said:

You have misunderstood me. What I said was…

15 hours ago, Sports Prophet said:

1. Total viewers are dramatically less likely to be unique viewers than physical attendees.

There are a dramatic less likely amount of individuals that will attend multiple fixtures in a single weekend vs individuals watching multiple broadcasts in a single weekend.

So what I am saying is, over a course of a weekend televised/streamed viewing figures, many of those kpi’s will be duplicates of the same individual, whereas the kpi’s from attendances are far less likely to be duplicates of the same individual.

You didn't state that your post was referring to any specific weekend.  You were commenting on the aggregate seasonal numbers.

I accept that in person attendance over a weekend will be more likely to produce unique watchers over tv as fans tend to attend their own club games but a TV viewer may watch multiple games.

But when you extrapolate this over the course of a season, the fact that many fans attend all their clubs games will significantly reduce the number of unique viewers for in person attendance.

[dkw]

3 hours ago, Hull Kingston Bronco said:

I’m sorry, but your concept of “NRL viewers watch more matches per round than AFL viewers, therefore there are more unique AFL viewers” has no basis in data. There’s nothing to suggest rugby league fans have a greater propensity to watch multiple games. Without it, the only point of suggesting this is to cover for an AFL weakness in the metrics. 

With a sample size this large, it’s clear that NRL has a far greater TV audience than AFL. It’s not even close. 

No hes right, for example I know for a fact loads of people are watching all the World cup games, but only a few of them watched the SL Grand final. Therefore I now believe there are more people that are fans of RL than football....

[Damien]

7 hours ago, Sports Prophet said:

Swans is just one example across a number of points I was making. My point stands correct though. The Swans are the biggest sports club in NSW. Financially and by membership.

This doesn't seem to tally with the financial reports. I thought I'd take a look at the last full year before Covid.

In 2020 the Sydney Swans:
Revenue: 30,642092
Loss: 6,100,236

In 2020 the Parramatta Eels:
Revenue: 67,121,573
Profit: 2,122,165

In 2020 Penrith:
Revenue: 132,865,00
Profit: 14,881,000

 

[Sports Prophet]

37 minutes ago, Dunbar said:

You didn't state that your post was referring to any specific weekend.  You were commenting on the aggregate seasonal numbers.

I accept that in person attendance over a weekend will be more likely to produce unique watchers over tv as fans tend to attend their own club games but a TV viewer may watch multiple games.

But when you extrapolate this over the course of a season, the fact that many fans attend all their clubs games will significantly reduce the number of unique viewers for in person attendance.

I didn’t have to. If my analogy is accurate (which it is) for any weekend, then that analogy aggregates over the course of a season. Because, despite many fans attending multiple fixtures in a season (like you have drawn attention to), the exact same can be said for the people watching on tv from week to week.

So if it’s correct for one week, it’s right for every week. This analogy does not only favour AFL, a person arguing against me in favour of NRL would be right to draw attention to “well what about the fan that in one weekend goes to one game of AFL and then watches another one or two on tv, they are not individual viewers either.” An accurate point.

All I have drawn attention to is that the figures presented so not give us enough data to make an accurate decision on total number of individual viewers. 

@Young Blood, if you don’t believe there is a good proportion of NRL viewers that are watching three or more fixtures a week, then I that is for you to decide, but I am one example of an individual that watches on average, over three live NRL games on tv a week. 

And just because Parramatta make a profit of $3m in whichever year it was and the Swans made a profit of $50k, has no bearing on which club is bigger. I would equally turn that point on its head and commend the Swans for keeping a minimal positive book at the end of a season. You would be better looking at income, because for every club you show me that is focused on increasing profits, I will show you a club that is not suitably distributing its resources towards winning a premiership.

[Sports Prophet]

6 minutes ago, Damien said:

This doesn't seem to tally with the financial reports. I thought I'd take a look at the last full year before Covid.

In 2020 the Sydney Swans:
Revenue: 30,642092
Loss: 6,100,236

In 2020 the Parramatta Eels:
Revenue: 67,121,573
Profit: 2,122,165

In 2020 Penrith:
Revenue: 132,865,00
Profit: 14,881,000

 

If you think including the turnover of an associated Leagues clubs is a suitable way to demonstrate the financial viability of a sports club, then I concede to you.

Fair business analysis would not include turnover or profits for seperate businesses though.

[gingerjon]

14 minutes ago, Damien said:

This doesn't seem to tally with the financial reports. I thought I'd take a look at the last full year before Covid.

In 2020 the Sydney Swans:
Revenue: 30,642092
Loss: 6,100,236

In 2020 the Parramatta Eels:
Revenue: 67,121,573
Profit: 2,122,165

In 2020 Penrith:
Revenue: 132,865,00
Profit: 14,881,000

 

2020 is a Covid year.

I'm not sure you'd see the Swans suddenly become majorly profitable but the last year before Covid would be 2019. 2020 was a Covid affected season and they played mainly outside Sydney or to empty houses*.

* = Insert own joke here

[Damien]

2 minutes ago, Sports Prophet said:

If you think including the turnover of an associated Leagues clubs is a suitable way to demonstrate the financial viability of a sports club, then I concede to you.

Fair business analysis would not include turnover or profits for seperate businesses though.

If you wish to pick and choose income streams to suit your view that's fine. It doesn't back up your claim though.

[Damien]

6 minutes ago, gingerjon said:

2020 is a Covid year.

I'm not sure you'd see the Swans suddenly become majorly profitable but the last year before Covid would be 2019. 2020 was a Covid affected season and they played mainly outside Sydney or to empty houses*.

* = Insert own joke here

That obviously works both ways though and still doesn't back up the claim made. The Sydney Swans still lost money in 2019 and Penrith and Parramatta still made money and had greater revenue.

[Dunbar]

31 minutes ago, Sports Prophet said:

I didn’t have to. If my analogy is accurate (which it is) for any weekend, then that analogy aggregates over the course of a season. Because, despite many fans attending multiple fixtures in a season (like you have drawn attention to), the exact same can be said for the people watching on tv from week to week.

I understand your logic but I don't completely agree with it.

In person fans are likely to be loyal followers of the club / sport (you made this point yourself earlier) while tv audiences by the nature of the accessibility of the medium would be more selective in what they watch.

I would suspect that if we got the underlying data, the longer the season went on, the smaller the proportion of unique attendees there would be in in person attendance compared to tv audiences. 

As we can see by SOO which generates a very higher number of viewers, there are plenty of 'latent' Rugby League fans who may watch their games far more selectively during the season than you suggest.

[Sports Prophet]

2 minutes ago, Damien said:

If you wish to pick and choose income streams to suit your view that's fine. It doesn't back up your claim though.

I am too tired to debate with someone that doesn’t realise Parramatta Leagues Club Ltd is a benefactor to PNRL.

 

[Damien]

1 minute ago, Sports Prophet said:

I am too tired to debate with someone that doesn’t realise Parramatta Leagues Club Ltd is a benefactor to PNRL.

 

That's good because it's boring debating with someone who consistently makes false claims without any basis.

[Sports Prophet]

10 minutes ago, Dunbar said:

I understand your logic but I don't completely agree with it.

In person fans are likely to be loyal followers of the club / sport (you made this point yourself earlier) while tv audiences by the nature of the accessibility of the medium would be more selective in what they watch.

I would suspect that if we got the underlying data, the longer the season went on, the smaller the proportion of unique attendees there would be in in person attendance compared to tv audiences. 

As we can see by SOO which generates a very higher number of viewers, there are plenty of 'latent' Rugby League fans who may watch their games far more selectively during the season than you suggest.

understanding your point also, I disagree, believing that very accessibility of tv give more opportunity for repeat viewers. Neither side of the coin is quantifiable.

SOO no doubt is the biggest sporting spectacle in the country I expect, rating very well in Vic, SA and WA as well as heartlands. I wouldn’t dispute that point. Does the casual viewership of SOO alone attest to the higher following of RL over AFL. Debatably yes, but not by me.

Did the article take into account memberships, I can’t remember. Did it take into account the levels of fandom and avg spend per member, not that I remember. there are so many various metrics to determine the popularity of AFL, NRL and any other sport. Having higher television figures is very far from the sole barometer to demonstrate which “sport is bigger”. I would argue it’s not even the most important.

I do wonder where the Melbourne Cup rates on that viewership scale. Not that I am suggesting the viewing figures of a two to four minute horse race could mean horse racing is Australia’s favourite sport.