Premier Sports secures rights for Top 14 rugby for next two seasons

It has been announced that Premier Sports has secured the rights for Top 14 action for the next two seasons.
In addition they are covering the run in to this year's competition with 4 matches being shown live this weekend. There is also a highlights program on Monday evening.
Happy days, I have really missed watching this comp since Sky dropped it.

I get the feeling Sky are slowly dropping out of rugby coverage full stop - they have rights to the Championship but even with Salarycens playing in it they're not showing any games.
They've lost/given up on English rugby, Celtic rugby and French rugby as well as the Euro comps, they only have the Lions and the AIs now.

Good to see them making advances like this in the British and Irish TV territories.

They'll have a broadcast licence for rugby in Ireland next season and they'll be available on a number of platforms like Sky, NOW TV, etc.

So hopefully, Premier as primary broadcaster for matches, with shared secondary rights with FTA channels in BBC, RTE, S4C and TG4.

Didn't they recently also secure the T14 aswell. Free Sports also has a ton of rugby too

Brendan wrote:Didn't they recently also secure the T14 aswell.  Free Sports also has a ton of rugby too

Err - the title of the thread says exactly that.

It's been reported today that a deal has been done for Premier Sports to continue as the primary rights broadcaster for PRO16 starting next season. BBC Wales and S4c to get some live games - 15 or so.

Whether its COVID or the new ownership, it definitely seems like Sky are less willing to pay up for sports. The EPL deal didn't increase in value, they're losing Eddie Hearn's boxing to DAZN and BT are taking bits away too

Seems like Sky have decided to consolidate around top level football, cricket, golf and F1 with rugby league and US sports as the next tier.

It will be interesting to see whether they do a themed, dedicated channel for the Lions tour, they've done it for plenty of other events and I assume they have the back catalogue of prior tours to use as filler.

Pot Hale wrote:

Brendan wrote:Didn't they recently also secure the T14 aswell.  Free Sports also has a ton of rugby too

Err - the title of the thread says exactly that.  

It's been reported today that a deal has been done for Premier Sports to continue as the primary rights broadcaster for PRO16 starting next season.  BBC Wales and S4c to get some live games - 15 or so.  

Ops.

Teach me to work and play at the same time.

BamBam wrote:Whether its COVID or the new ownership, it definitely seems like Sky are less willing to pay up for sports. The EPL deal didn't increase in value, they're losing Eddie Hearn's boxing to DAZN and BT are taking bits away too

Seems like Sky have decided to consolidate around top level football, cricket, golf and F1 with rugby league and US sports as the next tier.

It will be interesting to see whether they do a themed, dedicated channel for the Lions tour, they've done it for plenty of other events and I assume they have the back catalogue of prior tours to use as filler.

I do think sports rights have reached their peak. I also wonder now if Sky are looking at the fact that it looks like BT are giving up on the sports side of things (the report saying they plan to sell it off) and wondering if they just let that run it's course. They might then be able to pick stuff up cheaper or not need as much to sway viewers like they did when BT were taking some big rights off them.

neilthom7 wrote:

BamBam wrote:Whether its COVID or the new ownership, it definitely seems like Sky are less willing to pay up for sports. The EPL deal didn't increase in value, they're losing Eddie Hearn's boxing to DAZN and BT are taking bits away too

Seems like Sky have decided to consolidate around top level football, cricket, golf and F1 with rugby league and US sports as the next tier.

It will be interesting to see whether they do a themed, dedicated channel for the Lions tour, they've done it for plenty of other events and I assume they have the back catalogue of prior tours to use as filler.

I do think sports rights have reached their peak.  I also wonder now if Sky are looking at the fact that it looks like BT are giving up on the sports side of things (the report saying they plan to sell it off) and wondering if they just let that run it's course.  They might then be able to pick stuff up cheaper or not need as much to sway viewers like they did when BT were taking some big rights off them.

If BT did pull out does Premier have the money to get any of their rugby.  You would wonder if sky view club rugby as a niche sport because viewing figures can't be massive.  Lions and internationals have a much bigger following so are much better for signing people up for the year.

Brendan wrote:

neilthom7 wrote:

BamBam wrote:Whether its COVID or the new ownership, it definitely seems like Sky are less willing to pay up for sports. The EPL deal didn't increase in value, they're losing Eddie Hearn's boxing to DAZN and BT are taking bits away too

Seems like Sky have decided to consolidate around top level football, cricket, golf and F1 with rugby league and US sports as the next tier.

It will be interesting to see whether they do a themed, dedicated channel for the Lions tour, they've done it for plenty of other events and I assume they have the back catalogue of prior tours to use as filler.

I do think sports rights have reached their peak.  I also wonder now if Sky are looking at the fact that it looks like BT are giving up on the sports side of things (the report saying they plan to sell it off) and wondering if they just let that run it's course.  They might then be able to pick stuff up cheaper or not need as much to sway viewers like they did when BT were taking some big rights off them.

If BT did pull out does Premier have the money to get any of their rugby.  You would wonder if sky view club rugby as a niche sport because viewing figures can't be massive.  Lions and internationals have a much bigger following so are much better for signing people up for the year.

They managed to get La Liga and Serie A football but I think they put the prices up when that happened so i'd guess it depends on how hotly contested they were.