Channel Ten is "likely to gain a share" of the rugby league TV market in the next broadcasting deal, with matches to be played over five nights and networks paying more for less, according to Roy Masters of the SYDNEY MORNING HERALD. The NRL's next TV deal, to begin in '18, "will be the last contract under which viewers will be able to see" all games on free-to-air and pay-TV, before some games are streamed exclusively on the Internet, via "mega-rich overseas interests, such as Netflix." It "represents the last opportunity by cable TV and the free-to-air networks," including a commercially secure Ten -- should its partnership with Foxtel be approved -- to use live sport to "ward off the voracious" Internet challengers. The Australian Football League is also "expected to benefit from the networks' desperation to secure their future." The "intense" bidding for rights to both codes, with the AFL's expiring a year earlier, is "producing very complicated scenarios, with the most likely being Ten winning a game in both the NRL and AFL." The NRL's program cover could "see a Ten game on Thursday night, a Nine game on Friday night, three Fox Sports games on Saturday, two Nine games on Sunday and a Fox Sports Monday night game" (SMH, 7/14).
