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ANZAC Test delayed on Nine

Nine declines to broadcast a rugby leave match live from NZ, until after The Block airs.

The ANZAC Test match between Australia and New Zealand will be delayed when it airs on Nine tomorrow night.

The league game kicks off at 6:30pm AEST at Eden Park, Auckland. But Nine won’t begin the broadcast until 7:30pm following The Block.

The Courier Mail reports Nine has refused to screen it on a digital channel. While this is true of Brisbane and Sydney, it isn’t true in other states.

It airs on GEM in Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth -but it remains delayed in all three. Melbourne: 7:30pm, Adelaide: 7pm, Perth: 5:30pm.

With the game nearly over by the time the broadcast begins in Australia, fans will need to ignore websites, Twitter and social media to avoid hearing the results.

When Nine announced it would add NRL to GEM it said, “From round five of the NRL, the southern markets will broadcast two games in Friday Night Football, one live at 7.30pm AEST and the next one at 9.30pm AEST. Then on Sunday afternoon, a third match will go to air at 4.00pm nationally.”

NRL chief executive David Gallop was tactful in his response to the broadcast scheduling.

“Both the league and Nine recognise the appetite for live footy but there are practical limitations around the time difference with New Zealand for the Friday night game and there’s a need to give people the opportunity to be in their lounge room for the game from work,” Gallop said.

21 Responses

  1. What a bunch of whiners we all are. Nine’s job is to make a profit. They do that by getting people watching their channels. They know that the ratings for ACA / Block will be higher than the league (even in NSW / Qld)

    I’m a league fan (go to about 5 games a year). Yes, it would have been great for Nine to have shown the game live, but an hour delay isn’t the end of the world.

    Thank you Nine for showing the game.

  2. Sorry Courier Mail. Be in Victorian Shoes. This game last year would have been at Midnight and I would have to watch it from Ireland or another country online.

    I am glad that I do not have to wait up till Midnight and waiting till 2am to go to bed.

    I will not be endeavouring to get the score from 6:30pm onwards.

    ARLC need to fix the media deals and not be so inclusive of all markets

  3. @ Julian – the reason live sport gets such high ratings is because when it is delayed or repeated, it just isn’t as interesting as you can get the score of the internet and see the highlights on one of the many panel sport shows on TV (e.g. FoxSportsNews, SportsCenter on ESPN, NRL on FOX on FOX Sports 2, The Game Plan NRL on ONE, The Footy Show NRL on Nine, etc.) Now they only reason they have decided to delay it is because it wouldn’t be in primetime ratings. Now, from a business stand point this is a strategic idea. However, if you think about it in a business-customer relationship sort of way, the customer is sick of not getting the product they want so they alienate the shop and buy elsewhere (e.g. FOX Sports). Sports on FTA networks is becoming more and more of a joke with them only thinking about ratings (e.g. TEN delaying F1 on Sunday on their primary channel for ratings instead of live on ONE) and what state you live in (e.g. AFL being shown on either Seven or 7mate depending on the state you live in).

  4. This is a joke. All to often fans are left throwing their tv guide in the bin and simply using their Apps… If the nine network wants to have the rights to the games on friday and sunday then they should air them live, Fox sports manages to air 4 live games on a single day and their just as worried about ratings as nine. nrl should allow broadcasting on both networks and watch the nine network air them all live in order to compete, rather than sit back in their current trend bcoz they know they have the rights to it and there is nothing other stations can do about it.

  5. What a joke. Imagine come Olympics and Channel 9 stuffs it up like Vancouver 2 years ago?!

    Thank god for Foxtel. Will be watching it, despite Eddie being the face of the coverage.

  6. It’s pointless blaming nine for the delay because the match starts at 6.30 which is ACA/TT time. I have a feeling these two shows would get better ratings (and the Block will as well) so therefore that’s why they decided to delay it.

    As for showing it on GEM, they aren’t going to do that because then no-one would watch the broadcast on their primary channel.

    No other channel would do a better job (besides maybe TEN cause it doesn’t have any good programming at the moment and does poorly in the ratings), but I can’t see Seven removing TT to show this live.

  7. i hope the commission take note!!!!!! nine cannot have the next league free to air tv rights. they have treated us like donkeys all these years. please seven and ten get your act together and get nine out.

  8. Us league fans know this is a joke and expected it. There is no way nine will lose the rights without a fight so my only hope is that the new commission puts in a all games must be shown live nationwide agreement. I’ll still be watching the game tomorrow night delayed because i have no other way to, and that’s the problem. Nines excuses are getting old but what can we do ? Its the same with F1 on Ten’s new mediocre Sundays.

  9. Channel 9 only ever airs 1 game of rugby league live per week. This is atrocious! So it is no surprise for this game to be delayed. They need to learn something from Channel 7 and the AFL. NSW now gets at least 4 live AFL games on free to air TV each week and this is in a so-called ‘non-AFL state’. As a fan of both sports this is only going to result in people becoming more attached to AFL and is killing NRL in the ‘battle for western Sydney’ as well as the rest of NSW. Rugby league is on the path to a slow and painful death!

  10. No, we should get the game at 6.30pm eastern. They do it with cricket in summer – when people would normally get home later, so the arguement about people getting home onto lounges is BS.

  11. Nine has had the Sunday afternoon game delayed ever since they started, so one more game is no shocker. With FOX Sports and Nine putting up $1.2bn for the next 5 years I just hope FOX Sports will show them all live like the AFL and let Nine continue to show them when it is suitable for them. Like TV Tonight said the other week regarding an AFL game, even though it was shown on Seven there were still over 300,000 people who watched it on FOX Sports purely out because they know FOX Sports treats their viewers with some respect – “no ads siren to siren” “live and in HD” Australia wide.

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