AFL
- After 10 rounds & 89 mtchs of the 2017 AFL season, crowds +1.67% on ave – 35,016 from 34,440, +0.54% on aggregate to 3.116m up from 3.099m
- AFL superstar Patrick Dangerfield says the threat of players striking is greater in cricket than football as both sports continue to broker new pay deals.
- A PROPOSED North Melbourne AFL Women’s team is likely play a number of home games in Tasmania and will be well represented by the state’s best talent, Kangaroos chief executive Carl Dilena says. However, the name “Tasmania” in the team’s title appears to have been again left off the map following talks between North Melbourne and AFL Tasmania chiefs in Melbourne.
- WA Premier Mark McGowan has gone cap in hand to the AFL and the Federal Government for contributions to the $1.45 billion capital cost of the new Perth Stadium, arguing WA deserves the same support given to interstate facilities.
- Kate Sheahan — who signed as a rookie and played for Collingwood in the inaugural season of AFLW — has this week been installed as the Tigers’ AFL Women’s football operations manager in what looms as a vital component of the club’s AFLW licence bid.
- Virgin Australia, has become co-major partner of the Carlton Football Club for the remainder of 2017.
NRL
- After 12 rounds & 92 matches of the 2017 NRL season, crowds are down 3% from 1.506m to 1.457m (ave down from 16,380 to 15,841)
- At 15,841, NRL 2017 has the second lowest pre origin crowd average since 2012 (beaten by 2015 at 15,520)
- Player payments would break through the $1 billion mark in the next collective bargaining agreement and will “ultimately destroy the financial viability and structure of the game and its clubs” if a proposal from the players’ union is accepted, a leaked NRL document claims.
- Cooper Cronk has led a platoon of rugby league stars slamming the NRL for misrepresenting their demands in collective bargaining negotiations, revealing that trust with the governing body has been eroded after the players were unfairly portrayed as holding the game to ransom.
- The NRL navigates tricky financial waters between the clubs and its digital future
Super Rugby
- Just the one reported crowd so far for Round 14 – 12,040 for the match at Suncorp – with no result published for the game at Aami Park that we’ve been able to find so far. Australian season average down to 12,142 from 26 reported matches (4 with no crowd report), down 20% on same time in 2016.
- The ongoing uncertainty around which Super Rugby club will be cut from the competition next year has gone on too long and players are fed up.
A-league and other football
- FOOTBALL Federation Australia will take a far closer interest in the style of the broadcast when it sells the rights to the twin Arsenal fixtures in Sydney in July. The FFA keeps the broadcast rights when it licences A-League clubs to play against overseas teams, though the value of such deals has fallen from almost $1m four years ago to almost zero. The governing body still hopes to strike a deal for the Arsenal games, most likely with one of the free-to-air networks, but it’s understood the contract will stipulate certain provisions regarding the style of coverage in the wake of ABC’s widely panned attempts at a comedy theme.
General
- EON sports, the digital 24-7 sports radio network once backed by celebrity agent Glenn Wheatley, revealed on Friday that cost issues had necessitated an abrupt change of programming.
- Telstra has signed a multimillion-dollar deal with Fox Sports to help centralise production of live sports television coverage across 29 Australian stadiums to bases in Sydney and Melbourne. The new partnership, to be announced on Monday, will see the lion’s share of production work shift to two new remote production hubs in Sydney and Melbourne, owned by Fox Sports’ production partner NEP, rather than being done on site in large production trucks, which are typically expensive assets, roughly $10 million to $15 million each. The agreement includes all major rectangular and oval stadiums across Australia, including the SCG, MCG, WACA Oval, GABBA, Etihad, Adelaide Oval, Suncorp Stadium, Allianz, ANZ Stadium and AAMI Park.
