I’m sorry to say I missed the World Club Challenge at the weekend, well missed watching it live anyway, as I was away for a few days in the North East.
I went to a pub to watch the Leicester-Manchester City game in the hope that when the football finished, they would switch to watch Super League Champions St Helens go toe-to-toe with NRL Premiers Sydney Roosters.
Ironically, the television in the corner was showing the Wales-France game in the 15-a-side code so surely there must be some rugby fans in the house?
Well to cut a long story short, when the football finished they turned off the TV and my chances of watching the World Club Challenge were over.
Now I would bet there wasn’t one person in that pub who even knew there was one of the biggest rugby league games of the season on that night, this in a bar only about 10 miles from where we’ll all be heading in 12 weeks time for Magic Weekend.
To be fair this was Boldon not Newcastle, no doubt there would be a sports bar in the Toon showing the game (I hope so anyway) but even there it would probably play second fiddle to the golf from Mexico?
Attendances in Super League are another cause for concern. Credit: Mark Cosgrove/News Images
Sunday, whilst longing to be at the DW Stadium to watch Wigan play Hull FC, I settled down like millions of others to watch England play Ireland in front of 81,000 at Twickenham.
It’s a fixture they could probably have sold out three or four times over.
Don’t get me wrong, England played very well, but there wasn’t anything exciting to watch in 80 minutes, and the clock didn’t stop for a scrum.
I’m not here to have a pop at union, I’m probably more in envy of how they manage to promote the sport to a vast audience, but when it comes to the product on the field there is no comparison, which is probably even more frustrating.
When I was in Newcastle on Friday, every pub I went in advertised the Six Nations.
I wonder if it’ll be the same next year when St James’ Park plays host to England’s opening game in the Rugby League World Cup?
St James’ Park will host the opening game of the 2021 Rugby League World Cup. Credit: News Images
Obviously the Six Nations is on terrestrial TV and this is probably key.
Surely the Saints-Roosters game should have been made available to all on free-to-air TV, not just those with Sky!?
Like with the England Rugby League team, we need to show more matches on terrestrial TV to grow the sport in my opinion.
Our club game here is almost non-existent down south, they get to watch the odd Challenge Cup game but not enough to attract new people to the sport.
Instead of offering games like the World Club Challenge to the highest bidder, we should surely be paying BBC or ITV to show the game on one of their main channels.
Saturday might have been a tough sell given the schedule, but surely we could have got the game in on Friday night?
Terrestrial TV is key to the future of our sport, as is growing the International game.
Both boxes will be ticked when the Kangaroos come over at the end of the season and we also have the Challenge Cup in there too, but it’s not enough at the moment.
Friday night we saw three matches kick-off at the same time, the live derby between Castleford and Wakefield plus Warrington-Toronto and Hull KR-Huddersfield.
This doesn’t happen in football, the live games should stand alone gaining the sports’ full attention.
We should be spreading the games out over a full Super League weekend, as they do in the NRL – Thursday, Friday, two Saturday and three on Sunday.
I admit Thursday games aren’t popular but viewing figures are good, due to travel on school nights though we should maybe limit these to local derbies or away fixtures involving Catalans or Toronto?
Catalans are still hoping to strike a TV deal to broadcast their 2020 home games. Credit: Craig Milner/News Images
The two Sunday games would be at 1pm and 5.30pm to not clash with the Championship fixtures that afternoon.
TV coverage could be split between the broadcasters with at least one game a week offered free-to-air.
This surely could get our great game the exposure it deserves and maybe lead to us catching up with the NRL in the long run – ending the constant flow of our best players down under.
Even if six live games is too many, we could still offer one of the games to the terrestrial channels?
If Toronto and Catalans both sort out TV deals for their home games there could be four live games some weekends which is great, but how good would it be if we could watch all six?
It’s crucial that all Wolfpack games are shown live in North America, as with Catalans in France.
I do worry about crowds dropping if all games were on TV, but surely increasing the profile of the game would open it up to a new audience?
Many of this new audience would then attend games too, so it’s a no lose scenario!
I would love to hear your thoughts about increasing the profile of our game, because our players should be superstars.
Unfortunately, as it stands at the moment, when a Super League player steps outside of the M62 corridor, they don’t even get recognised.
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Gaz Parkisnon
February 27, 2020 at 11:00 am
The game is in drastic need of progression, yet it sits firmly in the dark ages. There are very few RL fans that will accept, let alone partake, in any “outside the box thinking”. Toronto are a clear example of this. More people are happy they they are struggling or happy that they and Noble have parted ways than they are happy about the game becoming more international.
The RFL haven’t helped. They showed no concern to ensuring that Toronto stayed up this year in the aim of expanding the sport.
If we collectively can’t get something as fundamental as promoting the game through physical mediums like Toronto being in the sport – we’ve no chance of the TV.
We also can’t afford to lose the TV rights that we get from Sky. Their funds prop up the vast majority of teams outside the Super League, and even some clubs in the SL would be in financial ruin without the money they get from Sky. The money from Sky essentially pays for the Salary Cap – so it keeps the players on the field. If we were to move away from Sky, most clubs would simply fold.
The game’s reliance on Sky is what holds it back. There are a few SL clubs that have their own TV now, and they record their own games. Catalans have every game recorded by a French TV station (or they did in 2019). All of these games “could” be televised through any medium. This could be a Subscription to the OurLeague App/Service. This could be a “Red Button” on a Sky Rugby League channel. It could even be a Rugby League Channel available as a subscription or as part of the package from Sky, Virgin and BT.
If SL clubs all had their own TV channels, and all clubs were recording their own games, and these were aired live all the time (fans selected which game they wanted to watch) then it would drastically cut the costs to Sky as they could simply piggy-back off the clubs feed.
Sky could still have their selection of the games. They could still demand which games they wanted full broadcasting rights for (such as Grand Finals, large Derby Matches, Magic Weekend, Summer Bash, etc.) but not need to cart their gear and staff around.
Surely offering this would make the game more accessible to fans. There are so many ex-pats that can’t watch the games outside of the UK – so offering this kind of service brings the game as a whole onto a more international stage.
And for the love of all things rugby, help to promote the game in other countries. I would love to see a North American Rugby League league out there. The World Club Challenge could be expanded to the top 2 teams of all 3 leagues and have a small cup over 2-3 weeks, alternating between locations each year . Promote the game more in NZ and you’ve then got 4 leagues that could compete in the same World Club Challenge.
But this is all pie in the sky. The RFL and the NRL need to work together on an international level for promotion. The RFL and Sky need to work together to increase the TV potentials. And other countries need to get on board and promote. The NZRL is semi-pro so underfunded, and Toronto are seemingly on their own over there in many respects.
Drastic change is needed from the top.
Geoff Hewitt
February 27, 2020 at 4:42 pm
Ex-pat Swinton Lions fan here. I missed the World Club Challenge too. Here in Florida we have lots of UK and USA rugby on TV, but it’s all RU not RL. Last weekend the full slate of live Six Nations matches was shown. RL World Club Challenge……. not. And we are trying to expand into this market?
Since RU got back into the Olympics, coverage on NBC, the Olympics channel, has sky rocketed to the extent that in the USA, rugby means RU. Just look at the weekend sports line-up for NBC and NBCSN as well as ESPN.
Long gone are the days of the Challenge Cup Final on ABC’s Wide World of Sports every May. Sad!