I know Stan normally has steered clear of bidding wars and paying overs for rights- but if they want to grow and be a serious rival to Fox/Kayo (like TNT is to Sky in the UK) they do need to get their elbows out and really go hard at getting rights to some of these more premium sports if they are serious about driving growth in subscriptions.
I’m sure Nine would do a better job this time around (I mean, they couldn’t really do worse than their efforts in the early ‘00s).
I’d imagine it would be everything live and commercial-free on Stan and say 6 to 10 live races on Channel 9 (or 9Gem/Go if during primetime or clashing with other sports).
If they were to get the rights I’d love to see them use the
F1TV coverage too, I’m tired of the parochial coverage from Sky Sports Lando.
There’s always been a British bias but it seems far worse than it was a few years ago (and other aspects of the coverage have also declined significantly in quality).
Comparing a time in which there was no digital channels, only 7, 9 and 10. To today in which all FTA have digital channels is silly.
Yes Nine, was delayed, but shows in the 80/90’s when they had rights, were big rating shows, so they were going to bring a live race from Europe over their number one time slot.
I don’t think Optus produce much for the EPL coverage. I think it’s mostly by the premier league themselves so if it does switch I can’t see too much changing
Isn’t a big problem that F1 has F1 TV and would like to make that available to as many countries as possible? I’m pretty sure that F1 will want to make F1 TV available in Australia which would make Stan Sport redundant (as it’s also just a streaming platform)?
Unless Stan gets a handful of races with the Australian GP also being on Nine and the rest only on F1 TV?
There have been cases where F1TV has stopped offering F1TV Pro in certain countries to allow exclusivity for the TV rights holders, France (with Canal+) and Germany (with Sky Deutschland) being two examples.
I would suspect that both Stan and DAZN/Fox/Kayo would insist on exclusivity in the next deal or restrictions so that either F1 TV Pro is restricted to their customers only or set at a high enough price that it would be similar in cost over the season to a Stan Sport or Kayo subscription regardless.
The question is if Stan can offer enough money to do that and pay for EPL rights.
If Stan managed to nab the F1 rights and regardless of if F1TV became available to Australians in general, we wouldn’t really get much more than some pre/post-session studio coverage unless they simulcast Sky F1 outside of the Australian GP? Nine might run highlights late at night at some point.
Also, who would host it? Nine haven’t aired much motorsport (as far as I remember) that they have hosted themselves since losing both F1 and MotoGP to Ten.
Foxtel will likely try their best to hold on to the rights because their non-sport linear channels are falling over left, right and centre. Sport is Foxtel’s only chance of survival in the next decade or so (same goes with FTA itself). Foxtel getting back the EPL rights would be a huge win for them and retaining the F1 would be the icing on top.
If Stan gets the F1 rights, I think it will dump other motorsport categories (IndyCar, Formula E, World Endurance Championship etc.) to help the balance sheet.
the problem is that Sky F1 isn’t exclusively F1 despite the name. I have the channel thanks to a mate in the UK (i actually have the complete sky steaming package) and just the other ngiht when i turned it on they had indy car on it and i doubt anyone would want blackouts on a linear channel
The people briefed on the agreement said no staff were expected to transition from Optus to Nine. The deal is considered attractive to Nine because it already has staff and infrastructure ready to take over the rights.
Nine’s plans are for local programming are unclear, as is whether it will invest more in match data, such as team lineups and statistics, in the same way that Optus did. A deal is expected to be signed as early as this week.
