This is the worst news for Rugby Union in the UK for decades. The Six Nations is the only time most people here give a shit about rugby. You take that off free-to-air TV and the sport becomes a closed shop with no shot at ever growing. - ThreadSky

squidgerugby.bsky.social • 35 days ago

This is the worst news for Rugby Union in the UK for decades. The Six Nations is the only time most people here give a shit about rugby. You take that off free-to-air TV and the sport becomes a closed shop with no shot at ever growing.

Reposted from Rugby Broadcast

BREAKING: TNT Sports are set to secure the TV rights to the Six Nations from 2026 according to RugbyPass 📺

- Limited FTA coverage hasn't been ruled out
- Unclear how this will impact coverage in Ireland

#GuinnessM6N

Comments

squidgerugby.bsky.social•35 days ago

But hey at least Bill Sweeney can keep paying himself those bonuses

georgemclachlan.bsky.social•35 days ago

I mean the BBC has said they aren't gonna bid, guess they blew their wad on English football

therealfakefick.bsky.social•35 days ago

We've had this problem in the US for a long time- more and more games and matches in the past 25 years have moved to cable or now to streaming, however, the most popular sport in the country (NFL) kept the vast majority of their important games FTA, which I do think is a coincidence.

djburges.bsky.social•35 days ago

So this is what CVC gets us. And they'll be extracting most of the money anyway. Disaster.

squidgerugby.bsky.social•35 days ago

It was always going to be the way. The deal seemed rotten from the start.

djburges.bsky.social•35 days ago

Hard agree. I guess Union was desperate for their cash injection at the time, but it was always an appalling deal long term. Are there any sports where a CVC deal has actually resulted in better outcomes for the host? They're parasites...

euant.bsky.social•35 days ago

I recall reading that it really screwed over the English prem (probably the rest too) in that they gave up a chunk of the TV revenue to CVC but the top line didn't grow enough to compensate so they are actually losing out every year after the one off bump.

gghofman.bsky.social•35 days ago

Yeah CVC deal was never going be good in long term, as any increase they might get was going go to repaying

djburges.bsky.social•34 days ago

Yes, the English Prem and the 6N both sold out very cheaply to CVC with a huge % slice - in return for some supposed way that CVC was going to "Grow the game" in the future. Which they have clearly not done. In fact just the opposite...

ianb101.bsky.social•35 days ago

I’m sure BBC will run a “Field of Dreams” style documentary when no kids from state schools are playing rugby anymore.

hfo1.bsky.social•35 days ago

Typical private equity view, maximise short-term profits, ignore long-term development.

j-evs.bsky.social•35 days ago

If the 6N goes behind a paywall will be an absolute disgrace.
It'll be the death of rugby

j-evs.bsky.social•35 days ago

Thank goodness for s4c at least some of the Welsh will be available

rdtanner2144.bsky.social•35 days ago

If TNT don't provide a Welsh language option. When the internationals in the autumn were on Amazon Prime because Amazon provided a Welsh language option then S4C didn't get rights.

j-evs.bsky.social•35 days ago

Good point.
Its disgraceful, in my opinion, that any major sport goes behind a paywall.
Cut off access to viewing sport then participation goes down

rconyard.bsky.social•35 days ago

This is appalling! So much history being thrown into the bin and quite possibly the death knell for youth engagement. It would be almost impossible for me to find an old teammate who wasn't introduced to rugby through the 5 (6) nations on the Beeb.

bmcleish.bsky.social•35 days ago

Absolutely - I am a minis coach and we always get an uptick in new players after the 6 Nations, especially of late as Scotland has been doing quite well!

darksatanicmills.bsky.social•35 days ago

Obviously difficult to divorce general opinion from ones own but it seems that already interest in the 6N has waned markedly over the last 5-10 years (in England).

Reasons could be the split between 2 channels, poor dumbed-down coverage (esp. BBC) and of course an inconsistent England side.

squidgerugby.bsky.social•35 days ago

Imagine how drastic it's going to be in three year's time. The autumn internationals on TNT no longer felt like an event as it was.

darksatanicmills.bsky.social•35 days ago

Yes, exactly this too.

mark-owen.bsky.social•35 days ago

How do you substantiate this 'waning'? Audience figures? Attendances?

darksatanicmills.bsky.social•35 days ago

As I say, just anecdotally.

How much effort people make to watch the games, and how interested they are to talk about them.

mr3402.bsky.social•35 days ago

For a sport who's wealth and power comes exclusively from the international game, this is a dreadful outcome for the sport. The domestic game in England struggles v Rugby League h2h, I cannot see how this is anything other than disastrous

squidgerugby.bsky.social•35 days ago

And look at how club rugby has condensed since leaving free-to-air TV. We're moving it all closer in line, test rugby will become the size club rugby is now in a few years.

paragraphfilms.bsky.social•35 days ago

Currently the 2nd most viewed sport in Britain, but I imagine +90% of those are casual Six Nations viewers. Looks like the death knell for Union in the UK.

https://www.ipsos.com/en-uk/rugby-union-britains-second-most-popular-sport

squidgerugby.bsky.social•35 days ago

I appreciate this, but those figures are from 2003. I suspect they've changed a fair bit since.

squidgerugby.bsky.social•35 days ago

Here's a graph on attendance from last year-

paragraphfilms.bsky.social•35 days ago

Agree attendance for Union can't compete (Home Nations have 6-8 home games a year vs 380 EPL fixtures alone) but TV viewing figures for 6N are currently enormous. Moving it to PPV is death knell for new & casual fans.

Think we're both saying the same thing 😁

squidgerugby.bsky.social•35 days ago

I wasn't disagreeing! Just trying to find more up to date data to support what you're saying.

leecaluan.bsky.social•35 days ago

However casual fans don’t contribute to rugby, 1 million or 100 million sitting at home watching 6 nations doesn’t help ospreys or Cardiff or anyone because they don’t go to club games or buy merchandise. I have no issues with this just the normal issue of a poorly run WRU 🤣🤣

briangberry.bsky.social•34 days ago

Not just a rugby thing. Warner Brothers Discovery are simplifying/merging/dominating sports into a single more comprehensive and expensive brand, TNT.

Tour de France is also having its FTA TV rights removed for UK from 2026 - ITV4 fans unhappy.

£7 Eurosport is being merged into TNT and will be £31

conor-harty.bsky.social•35 days ago

Hard to understand what way World Rugby thinks about the game. Busting a gut to grow the sevens game and letting the brand of the Six Nations dim behind a paywall … it’s bad enough that 6N ticket prices are extortionate, but this is a rubbish move.

davidmccrae.bsky.social•35 days ago

The weird silver lining is that this might be a big boon for the women’s game, if it’s the only rugby left on FTA TV. Especially the impact RWC25 is sure to have on the game

kalshadaar.bsky.social•35 days ago

How do they expect to grow this game if it's behind a paywall.

willvignoles.bsky.social•35 days ago

Taking test cricket off FTA has been a real double-edged sword for cricket, and rugby is a smaller sport, faces far more competition for attention due to taking place during the football season and presumably also will get far less money than the ECB did. All the downside, few of the positives.

8bitcricket.bsky.social•35 days ago

I don't think it has been a double edged sword - the net effect of increased pay and conditions is hugely outweighed by the exclusionary effect of pay tv (and ticket prices for live attendance) being way outside of the reach of many potential fans. That on top of lost playing fields kills cricket.

8bitcricket.bsky.social•35 days ago

I consider myself reasonably well-off, but I went back through old calendars and kept tickets and 15 years ago, I was doing an average of 6-8 cricket matches, 3-4 rugby and 3-4 football games a season, plus the occasional basketball or other. Now I got to about 3 cricket & maybe 1 of rugby/football.

willvignoles.bsky.social•35 days ago

Yeah I suppose more accurate would be that it has at best been a double-edged sword. From everything I've seen it's not like grassroots of either is in a good place - the cricket and rugby clubs I was a member of until I moved away both went from fielding four teams a week to struggling to field one

8bitcricket.bsky.social•35 days ago

And Australian Rugby is in an even worse place - trying to compete in what is probably the most competitive football market in the world, dominated at club level by AFL & NRL with the A-League football close behind, union tried to expand and shot itself in the foot.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWLbaYHlI9w

pudsey68.bsky.social•35 days ago

Ah well, that's me not watching ANY rugby then. Brilliant move!

sprescott.bsky.social•35 days ago

Concur, if they feel the game is stalling in growth they should be looking at other ways to expand the tournament - eg Spain etc. This is not good news for the game. And what happens to the Women’s Game? Is w6n included?

radiogoddard.bsky.social•35 days ago

This is tragic.

Anecdotally as someone who only got into watching rugby around 2019, it was a big leap to get a TNT sub to follow a club team, and I nearly cancelled it after a year of not engaging with it enough before I got properly into it.

I’d never have done it if it weren’t for 6N FTA.

latkinson.bsky.social•35 days ago

Out of curiosity, do we know if this is for men's and women's? It's so sad to think that with the women's world cup in the UK this year, tehre was a real chance to show it off and get people interested properly only to find out it's behind a pay wall to watch.

8bitcricket.bsky.social•35 days ago

Pay TV is where sports go to die. It's effect on cricket has been hugely negative. Football is a bit of an outlier because of it's vast popularity, but most of a sport's potential audience simply cannot afford a SkySports subscription and therefore are excluded.

https://www.everyonetv.co.uk/news/opinion/why-uk-favours-live-free-sport

chriswrig.bsky.social•35 days ago

A very strange way to 'grow the game' and attract a wider audience........

yorkirish.bsky.social•35 days ago

It’ll end up like cricket. Totally niche sport, fragmented competitions, watched by virtually no one. Catastrophically short sighted decision.

iskragoch.bsky.social•35 days ago

A stupid decision by the 6 Nations. Apart from the money-grabbing wasters, the only beneficiaries will be pubs & clubs (particularly in Wales). Looks like the Old Arcade & the City Arms will be even more packed on international days - if that's possible.

bmcleish.bsky.social•35 days ago

I was going to say the same - I think my rugby club will do well out of it in the short term - far more people coming in to watch the 6 Nations games - but it will choke off the supply of new players. As a minis coach, I have noticed that we always get an uptick in new players after the 6 Nations.

davekidd-58.bsky.social•35 days ago

Spitting feathers!
The writing was on the wall but all our protestations led to naught.
The only key metrics are how many kids turn out for their local sides & the health of the pyramid!
Gentlemen of the 6Nations committee:- I give you cricket!The same corporate greed will also ruin our game.

giannirivera.bsky.social•35 days ago

Think about all the pubs etc. that screen the 6Ns as it’s FTA; the deal with TNT may look good in the short term but they’ll lose loads of casual eyeballs which will impact wider ad & sponsorship revenue- will Guinness stick around (cf Heineken in ERC)?!

readysaltedtear.bsky.social•35 days ago

Going to be hard to enjoy this season knowing what comes next tbh

geraintultimus.bsky.social•35 days ago

It will be the end of my interest in Men's rugby. Just the women side left for me.

mickyates.bsky.social•35 days ago

@howler123.bsky.social

howler123.bsky.social•35 days ago

I have long been of the opinion that some sport should be ringfenced for mainstream TV. For me, this would include the FA Cup final, the Six Nations, home Test Matches, the RL cup final, and the Epsom Derby.

smudgestoke.bsky.social•35 days ago

Earlier this month in Spain I thought I'll be able to watch the Supercopa Final between Real Madrid and Barcelona on the telly at our apartment. Couldn't find it so went a bar that had it on and they told me it was pay per view and shockingly I then realised it was taking place in Saudi Arabia🤷‍♂️

howler123.bsky.social•35 days ago

Yes, no consideration for the casual watcher any more. Begs the question of how you get people new to different sports to pay? Nobody gets drawn in.

smudgestoke.bsky.social•35 days ago

No consideration for the match going fans of each team either playing the bloody thing over there.

howler123.bsky.social•35 days ago

Plus all the ridiculous kick off times for the benefit of the TV pay per view channels

mickyates.bsky.social•35 days ago

Clubs like Fulham, Spurs, Manure seem to want to price regulars out in favour of corporate and tourists. They don't want us old lags. At least Stoke can't be that picky.

mickyates.bsky.social•35 days ago

Grand National, working man's sport vs Derby, Sport of Kings. Up the Workers.

howler123.bsky.social•35 days ago

I was going to add 'there are others'.

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