Sorry if this has been covered but not been on these boards all that much for a while.

Mr Wood has numerous bad decisions over the past couple of years.

We all know the problem with Premier, only available on Sky or online, which is restricting your audience from the start, only an idiot would choose this as the platform to broadcast using this company.

Before i slate him for the World Cup (other than England games) being on Premier Sports, can someone enlighten me as to why Premier were chosen? Were they the only bidders? I don't believe for one minute they outbid anyone, were they the only offer on the table?

Surely someone should have put it requirements that they have to get the channel on Virgin, Freeview, BT etc before being given the go ahead??

Sky were really really interested in the RLWC but were outbid by Premier Sports.

That's how really really interested Sky were.

I wonder if it was a case of that or no TV exposure at all (England games and the latter stages notwithstanding). I am surprised BT Sport weren't all over it as a cheap filler for their new channel.

Don't the BBC have an option to broadcast more of they wish to? I know they have the highlights package.

We needed prime time BBC coverage to take the World Cup to a big audience

A deal with SKY wouldn't let this happen, so I don't think the RL had much option

I presume SKY would have been willing to do the whole thing, but they wanted exclusivity on Package 1 (the 'big games').

It was the correct decision to go with BBC for the big games, and if that leaves the choice of Premier Sports or no-one for the rest - then Premier Sports is clearly the best option.

The RFL made the correct decision but ofcourse,people who know nothing about the bidding contest believe differently.They are the same people who always know the winner of the 3.00pm at York but will only tell you at 3.15pm.

Sly put forward the highest financial bid but wouldn’t share with the BBC,

Premier sports put the best bid forward where all games were shown live, but the big games could be simulcast on the BBC.

which is why I think the RFL have made the correct decision. Would rather see a few million see England live on BBC1 each Saturday, than just 200K on Sky Sports for each game.

Premier Sports bid may also make SKY wary of rival bids from Premier, BT Sport etc next time the SL rights come up for tender. They have had a monopoly on the rights for far too long now.

also as much as we can try and dress it up, there are some low-profile games that are best not shown to the masses on BBC or SKY, such as games involving the USA, Cook Islands etc I can only imagine the 'outrage' on here if Cook Islands-USA at Bristol was live on SKY with a few thousand in the ground



the way the TV deals have been arranged, we are in effect giving casual viewers a 'greatest hits' package of the biggest and best attended games on BBC1.

its exactly the right way to go. It woudl have been nice to have the remainder of games on Sky just for the secondary and less tangible promotion that Sky would have done to sports fans for us.

But the priority was getting the games we got on the BBC, at good times, with good promotion and highlights packages etc.

Sorry just found this funny...

Obviously it would be great if the BBC showed more games live and longer highlights at a better time but given the options on offer this package seems better than selling the whole lot to SKY as per usual.

I think you have read my post in a different light to what i actually asked.

I am not sure where i was quoted saying it is a bad decision having the England games on the BBC. Of course it is a wonderful decision the games are the BBC, the more RL on terrestrial TV the better.

Now back to my original post, i was ASKING why they chose Premier Sports, nothing else.

Many people have kindly answered that for me, it seems they were the only bidder willing to share with the BBC. If that is the case, then of course having games on the BBC is top priority over sky/cable.

However, with this being the RL and prone to making very strange decisions that usually devalue the game, i enquired to see if it is the truth that Premier were the only option.

The bit I quoted was the fact that you said "before I slate him for the World Cup...." straight after you had said "only an idiot would choose this as the platform to broadcast..."

Clearly you slated him beforehand, in fact the sentence before.

I now remembered why i don't use this forum at all these days.

He is right though. You did say that

Yes i think Nigel Wood is an idiot.

I did say only an idiot would choose to give it to Premier (or was there no other bids on the table).............

I did say before i slate him (i should have added "even more"icon_wink.gif..................

Now people, I asked for information in a nice manner and many kind people enlightened me regarding the decision for which i am grateful. I will leave it there.

Now we do too.

I think going with Premier Sports was a good decision. That way we get big games on the BBC with premier sports also showing every game, Also adding their online player which is really good for catch up.

I know Premier isn't available on Virgin for instance but I have the online player and think it really is worthwhile.

Good to see that we aren't bowing down to sky for once either.

Yep it's a shot across the bows to Sky. With BT Sport coming along RL might have some competition for the next TV deal.

BT are fully in bed with Union EXCEPT for the exempt? 6 nations (is this STILL one of nations establishment FTV treasures?)
Anyway it looks to me, especially as to how it is being advertised and promoted that not all is not well in BT land. Very similar I see it to ESPN ( which they still carry) Getting Cable on board was an interesting move but then Virgin don't want premier because it is not high enough profile. Well BT , to me is even lower profile. I happen to have BT as a "freebie" and the little I have seen ( about 10 minutes of various things) would not make me want to pay for what they have.
Premier have been good for RL, IMO, regarding exposure on the satellite platform and the quality of the games and value for money far surpasses the mess the game about Sky stuff.
Sky got ditched when they went to Thursday against the championship. Bad move by Sky in so many ways but then we all know that everything SL wise is wonderful and perfect in every way. Posters on here keep saying it is.
I'm going to see the entire World Cup for £19.98.
Value for money all the way. Sky deffo is not but then I don't like paying mainly for Mo & Ron Ball's game.

There is nothing wrong with the deal. At last we have free to air coverage.

Sky maybe the big money spinners, but they kill exposure.

RL needs exposure as constantly chasing the money has made us suffer long term as our public awareness has fallen as has our ability to get sponsorship.

RL fans in whinging shocker.

Wrong.

Virgin Media do want Premier, but they want it bundled with the XL package and Premier Sports don't want that, they want it as a separate subscription. Nothing at all to do with not being high enough profile.

Only have to look at popularity of Netlfix (see 'Breaking Bad') to see whilst online only being an inconvenience.. it's hardly an issue nowadays.

Also surely there's more people with Sky than Virgin..

Oh Sky have more than Virgin then that's just fine then is it? Lets not bother about the 3 million that subscribe to Virgin Media TV services. How narrow minded of you. I won't even mention the millions that have other TV platforms that it should be available on.

My op was asking if someone made the decision to go with premier or were they the only offer on the table. I have been made aware it was really the only way the RFL could go. We all agree that having as much RL on terrestrial TV is a good thing.

Having the WC games on a platform that only serves SKY customers or people that are prepared to watch it on a laptop/tablet/mobile is not how i imagined a sport should be looking to showcase it's World Cup....it's a great shame.

Do you have a newish TV? If so, you can connect your laptop to the TV and watch on the big screen, and all for a tenner a month without having to fork out the exhorbitant amount us Sky customers do in order to watch the TV version of Premier Sports each week.

Premier have done a great job with the Championships. Their style is homely, which suits the Championships, but very professional and their production crew are all rugby league fans, which you would know if you bought last months Forty20 magazine as I did (great mag that, well worth reading).

They also show matches from different levels of RL. I've seen college RL, amateur RL and international RL from Canada on there as well as the NRL and Championship matches. They bloody well deserve the World Cup on their enthusiasm for RL alone. I hope loads of people sign up for their world cup coverage and give their coffers a boost so that they are still with us for next season.

Sky weren't interested in sharing the England matches. If this world cup is successful then Sky may have a Paralympics moment (the BBC officially regretted not putting in a higher bid for the Paralympics when they saw how successful they were). If that happens then that could be very useful for us in the future as clearly Sky have been withdrawing from rugby league over the last few seasons.