NRL inks multi-billion dollar broadcast rights deal with Nine, Foxtel
Updated ,first published
Nine and Foxtel have announced a $5.3 billion dollar agreement to keep airing the NRL, striking a pact – on the eve of the Origin decider – that the game is billing as a path to decades of growth in Australia and abroad.
The deal, announced on Tuesday and set to run from 2028 until 2034, makes the sport’s airing rights more valuable than the AFL’s rights, a longstanding goal of the Australian Rugby League Commission chairman Peter V’landys.
“The deal future-proofs the game for everybody,” V’landys said at a press conference to announce the deal, which is up about 80 per cent on the last NRL rights deal, on Friday. “For the next 20 to 50 years … it gives us the platform to not only grow the game here in Australia, but globally.”
Under V’landys, the NRL has expanded its teams – it will hit 20 sides within the life of the deal – and taken matches overseas to Las Vegas as part of a play to rival other sporting leagues, such as the NFL, with global appeal. That, V’landys claimed, had made the NRL the most watched game in the Oceania region.
The price
Nine, the owner of this masthead, will pay $145 million cash annually for the free-to-air TV rights, the company said in a statement to the market on Tuesday. It will get $10 million of that back from the NRL in return for advertising and other services, but provide another $15 million in free advertising, known as contra.
“It secures us for another seven years, which is a really good, significant period of time for us to base our business around,” said Nine chief executive Matt Stanton.
Foxtel, which was last year bought by billionaire businessman Sir Leonard Blavatnik’s DAZN, is expected to pay around $520 million annually for the pay TV component.
It has paid about $270 million a year for the existing deal, marking a sharp uplift in its sports costs. V’Landys said the deal reflected a shift in how people were watching sport, with increasing numbers choosing to view games on smartphones via Foxtel’s Kayo streaming app.
“The deal reflects the structural change in how consumers watch the game and how they consume the game,” V’Landys said.
Asked whether Foxtel had paid so much that it would have to raise prices for cable and Kayo subscribers, chief executive Patrick Delaney said he was focused on adding more subscribers rather than raising prices, but did not rule out a change.
“It’s all about volume. The more people that watch it, the more subscriptions we have, the better we can go. We’ve got a very big, strong, diverse business. We’re aligned on affordability,” he said.
V’landys said he wanted to protect affordability of the NRL. “I’m a migrant kid from Wollongong, I never forgot my roots, and I will ensure that the price point will be protected,” he said.
Nine’s share price was up 1.3 per cent to 92 cents a share on Tuesday afternoon.
The deal eclipses the AFL’s record $4.5 billion deal over seven years, which the rival code signed in 2022 and which runs from 2025 to 2031, despite mainstream media companies coming under increasing cost pressures in the years since.
The games
Nine will get free-to-air rights to three games a week, as well as exclusive rights to State of Origin and the NRL Grand Final. The agreement ensures that State of Origin will remain on Wednesday night, and returns the draw – which had previously been done in conjunction with the broadcasters – back to the NRL.
The deal comes ahead of Origin III on Wednesday night, and before the departure of NRL chief executive Andrew Abdo.
The deal also incorporates the intended addition of a 20th team – most likely to be based in Christchurch or in the south-west corridor of Brisbane – which would bring the number of games per round to 10.
The deal will also retain the long-time status quo in NRL coverage, with the NRL reaping the benefits of competitive tension in the market during the bidding process to push up the price. Both Nine, owner of this masthead, and Foxtel separately pitched bids to take on the rights in full and effectively cut out the other. Other media companies were also interested.
The deal extends Nine’s partnership with rugby league into its fourth decade. “Rugby League is part of Nine’s DNA, and it is one of Australia’s most important sporting and cultural assets,” Nine chair Peter Tonagh said.
Abdo, who is departing the NRL to become chief executive of Tennis Australia, said that the new deal was a “massive win” for the league.
The record deal achieves V’landys’ long-standing goal of beating the AFL, and defies a downturn in the television advertising market and the potential impacts of the Albanese government’s impending gambling advertising restrictions on broadcasters.
When asked about whether he was proud of beating the rival code, V’landys joked that he had never heard of AFL, which he then referred to as the “FLA”.
Nine’s Stanton said a rejection of the company’s pitch to acquire the full rights was not a loss for its streaming platform Stan.
“We tried to put our best foot forward … but, you know, we were very pleased with the free-to-air rights, [which] was the minimum.”
The massive deal also increases the likelihood of V’landys becoming the league’s all-powerful executive chairman this year, although the NRL boss insisted he still needed time to consider taking on the role.
“I’ve done everything I can in the game… in the last five years, with Andrew and myself, we’ve turned the game into a $5.3 billion empire,” he said.
“That crosses my mind, naturally, because why try to write another chapter when you’ve written a book?”
The Business Briefing newsletter delivers major stories, exclusive coverage and expert opinion. Sign up to get it every weekday morning.
Kishor Napier-Raman is a senior business writer for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age. Previously he worked as a CBD columnist and reporter in the federal parliamentary press gallery.Connect via X or email.
Chris Barrett is a senior sports reporter for The Sydney Morning Herald. He is a former South-East Asia correspondent for the Herald and The Age.Connect via X or email.
