And the rest is history.
Since I was born (in 1991), I’ve only ever known rugby league to be on Channel Nine.
The same went for cricket on Nine and the Australian Open tennis on Seven until those two sports swapped homes in 2018-19.
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And Nine’s coverage of premiership games in 1992 was not popular with some.
This from the Sun Herald 15 March 1992.
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Great find
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I believe this led to Andrew Denton’s “Free The 33” campaign
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Why was Nine reluctant to move 60 Minutes from 7.30pm so that they could show the full game? I wonder if they might have offered the Sunday game to the ABC for that reason. I know the Sunday match aired live in the non-RL states then.
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I could ask why Burke’s Backyard was put on at 7:30 on a Friday Night. It started out on Saturday midday.
Back then clubs were more reliant on gate takings so not having games on live was to maximise crowds.
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I don’t think it was about protecting crowds - a delayed coverage allowed 9 to insert more ads.
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I guess there was nowhere else for it to go since Sunday night movies were popular back then too. And it was the same timeslot nationally.
I recall for the finals games in the early 90s Nine did air a full replay for those, but from 5.30 with the news at 5pm and 60 Minutes still at 7.30. I’ll post a TV Guide for that today.
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The irony is this is the same network that probably pushed for a night time Grand Final
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No doubt they did… I don’t think the NRL really wanted it then, only did it because it suited Nine for their TV ratings.
And TV Guide as promised 2 posts above now posted here Classic TV Listings - #8284 by Radiohead
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Channel 7’s 1981 doco covering “25 Years of Sport” now out of the vault and online
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With all the hype of the upcoming Melbourne Spring Racing Carnival of 2025, I thought I’d like to share with you all the Network 10 Melbourne Cup Carnival trailer for 2001 (The last broadcast on 10 before 2019). This is the VIC and NSW/ACT Version.
As you can see at the 0:34 mark of the video, no mention of the last race taking place at 5:15 PM AEDT (Shown during 10 National Weekend News and Sports Tonight and mind you same thing occurred Melbourne Cup Day).
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The last race on Cup Day from my memory according to Paul Lang’s videos was shown during the 5PM evening news
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For viewers in Victoria and both of NSW/ACT during both Derby Day (As you can see on the 12:17 mark of the video below) and Melbourne Cup Day.
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Credit: YouTube/DOCKERMANIA
Full broadcast of a One-Day Cup match from Adelaide Oval ij 2011-12
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Once again, Courtesy of Paul Lang’s Youtube Channel and I know that I have seen this particular vid before on Facebook, here we see two gentlemen in Bruce and Dan Mielicki that called the Melbourne Cup race for 10 (Long before Matt Hill first did it across all Networks) between 1984 or 1985 and 2001. Also worth mentioning that this would’ve been the third time since 1988 that Bruce and Dan Mielicki were seen together (The only other time would’ve been 2018 when Seven, for now last exclusively broadcast the Cup on an episode of Racing dot com’s Calling the Cup that also featured Greg Miles).
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ABC’s Sunday hour-long highlight of Saturday Super League from 1990. Bears v Sharks:
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Before Channel 9 i have memories of Grand Final Day watching on Channel 10 at 10am when the coverage started then around 2:30pm when NBN’s coverage would start for the clear picture.
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Think you will find the live Saturday VFL coverage RVN had was sourced from Broadcom that year. SBS used to air the live Saturday VFL match that year too, but only into Sydney, while the rest of SBS nationally received repeats of The Noise or a movie. Not sure where the VFL coverage was sourced from, whether it was from Broadcom or ABC Victoria? ABC NSW and QLD had live NSWRL Rugby League commitments and could not run the live VFL match. The then TVQ0 in Brisbane took the Broadcom coverage of live VFL Saturday afternoon matches that year too. Not sure what arrangements occurred in SA and WA that year for live Saturday VFL match coverage, pubs only I guess?
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