The Olympic Games in France may not have had a rugby league presence, but our sport can learn some lessons on how to broaden its audience.
11.6 million viewers!
This is the number of people who watched the Olympic rugby sevens tournament in France, according to France Television (the Gallic counterpart of the BBC). The fourth best audience for the Olympics in France.
France men’s team won the gold medal giving French rugby union is first ever significative world title 152 years after the foundation of the first union club on French soil: le Havre Athletic club. And also 100 hundred years after the expulsion of rugby union from the Olympics following a noxious and disastrous Grand Final between France and the USA in Paris in 1924 (with only three teams competing and not a single ‘home nation’).
So, what does it have to do with rugby league?
Actually, it gives it a landmark; the potential tv market for a fast, simple and attractive form of rugby in France.
Given that the French public in the majority only hear about rugby union (simply called ‘rugby’ here), of course, everything was done to attract the public in these special circumstances. As France Television got the rights to broadcast the Olympics, they promoted the tournament accordingly and any particularly any sport where French athletes could get a medal. Their journalists and callers became ecstatic entertainers. It goes with the territory. You create a media hype about what you’ve paid for. Nothing wrong with that, that’s economics! Your competitors becoming suddenly more journalists than entertainers. That’s ethics, but it’s another subject.
As usual, France union was also very good in communication and showed also how big their influence in France is; the captain of the rugby sevens team, Antoine Dupont was appointed as the French flag bearer at the closing ceremony; many would have appointed Léon Marchand after his four gold medals in swimming instead. Marchand gained some consolation as he appeared at the beginning of the ceremony.
Anyway, I won’t lie to you; 11.6 million of viewers is presently out of reach for French rugby league. A more reasonable target, or working hypothesis would be the average number found with the competitions organised by our union compatriots; an average of 6 million viewers for the Six Nations tournament in 2024. About 4 million for the union Grand Final. I’m not obsessed by union but it seems relevant to make the comparison as there’s not a such a big social gap between union and rugby fans – or no more to reassure the historians – and the target audience lives more or less in the same areas. Potentially, if we don’t alienate them regularly, the union public may be our public someday too. Some of them are already, and some of the RL fans like to watch union as well. Do I have to recall that the Union magazine ‘Midi Olympique’ devotes one page weekly to French rugby league? You may call it a new French paradox; I’ll call it a local nuance.
As you may guess by yourself, it is difficult to find some precise figures in France for rugby league. 500,000 televiewers would be a good educated guess for a big rugby league match in France. A number announced by the Catalans Dragons themselves in a 2021 Tweet (Dragons vs. Hull KR, home game won with a golden point by the locals).
Therefore, French rugby league has a long way to go.
Especially since the cancellation of the World Cup in France; this event pulled the rug from under the feet of the Treizistes. And the perspective of that long and vain qualifying tour of the French national sides for that remote World Cup in 2025 in Australia mustn’t be taken as granted in terms of communication. That qualifying round and the next World Cup will be easily inundated with news of the French major sports. At union, it did happen that major rugby nations (Scotland, and even England once) had to qualify for a World Cup; but it consisted of one or two games in Europe. Nothing more. Not this obstacle course like the one the Chanticleers will have to face.
Yet, nothing is lost in terms of TV audience and I found two reasons of hope.
The first one, of course, comes from Catalans Dragons who, step by step, regain some media attention for rugby league in France; for instance, they got their August home game against Wigan televised on l’Équipe. An unfortunate home defeat 18-26 but a good game to introduce rugby league to the public with a stadium well-filled and full of atmosphere.
“Wait!”, you say if you follow French rugby league, “This is not news, I heard that before!”
Usually, the games are televised on l’Équipe Live 1 or l’Équipe Live 2, the IPTV channels of the group but very rarely on the eponymous free-to-air channel. For watching that game, all French people had to do is to dial the number 21 on their remote control. They didn’t even need to have an internet connection. A mere antenna was enough, even if, for some young treizistes, this is completely old-fashioned and a “senior” thing, it’s still preferred by the majority of my compatriots. And yet again, if I wanted to be complete, I could tell you that those tv channels are also available directly on some smart TVs (but not all the makes provide this access) or via a HDMI cable.
The second one is fed with the efforts made by the French clubs and the Federation to offer the public of spoiled children we are, blasé with football, some images, some games to watch.
And this season, the Federation made a complete rebrand of the men’s élite 1 competition; ‘SUPER XIII’ is the new name of it. Élite 1 had a problem of identification, and the name was already used by some others. And guess, by who? By union for example for their major women’s competition.
There were very few alternatives; ‘Top 13’ was mentioned. But it was probably too close to its big hyped union rival ‘Top 14’. ‘Super XIII’ (with thirteen written in roman numerals) is not only a simple name, easy to recall but it prevents any confusion. Its logo is similar to the ones of some other competitions in France. It is easy to recognise a hexagon, the nickname also of Continental France (draw a hexagon around the sides of France on a map, you’ll get it). As last season, games will be televised on 3 IPTV channels (one of them, nothing is simple in France, being also a free-to-air channel but only in a large part of the south of France, Vià Occitanie to name it).
French clubs are also becoming more and more efficient in getting all the spotlights they can from other events. At the time of writing, the Paralympics are in progress here in France. And among the sports offered to the public, there’s this strange wheelchair ‘rugby’ (aka ‘Murder-ball’) played with a round ball and where passing forward is allowed. Well, it didn’t prevent the Nice RL wheelchair section from receiving exceptional coverage from the local station of the private channel BFM. Wheelchair rugby league is becoming a way to promote disabled sport and vice versa, even if RL and Olympics (or Paralympics) are unfortunately like chalk and cheese.
There is undoubtedly an effort made by the French stakeholders to gain room in the over-saturated French sport market. And this is so hard that I’m not even sure that NRL would like the job. Even if their interest for our game would bring an interesting change in France and could frighten the powerful and established France union. But this is pure science fiction. France is far from Sydney, Brisbane, the Las Vegas casinos and she’s not Anglophone. Fortunately, NRL provides unwittingly an indirect support; its games are still televised on the pay channel Beinsport.
There aren’t many cards to play but Treizistes do play all of them.
I don’t expect to see in my life time a rugby league game in France reaching that magic number of 11.6 million viewers. But I’m more confident in the taste of my compatriots for fast-action sport; all Treizistes have to do is not lose the public with too many secondary media options and preferably pick the ones that are easiest to access. Younger upcoming generations will completely skip classic television anyway, in favour of the various applications available on tablets, mobile phones or other media devices.
It’s a big challenge, but far from being lost.
First published in Rugby League World magazine, Issue 501 (October 2024)
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