Quote: Andy Gilder "You're joking right?
The BBC are only interested in the live rights to elite events, they've made that much clear by getting rid of the likes of Grandstand and Sportsnight and switching to single event coverage rather than magazine style shows.
They won't have the slightest interest in taking on the rights to an essentially second-tier competition, even if you gave them away - it doesn't fit their current strategy for sport.'"
I would think that the axing of Grandstand had more to do with the dwindling number of sports that the BBC still has/had the rights to and the lack of things to make up the show with. In its later days it was pretty much horse racing with the odd interruption and then the football scores. If they were concentrating on big events only then I doubt they would have let ITV get their hands on such large cash cows as the FA Cup, Premiership highlights and F1 as they have done in recent years.
On your second point. Unfortunately any RL event at the moment would be viewed by the media as "second tier" as the sport does not have the national profile or international credibility of other sports on offer. The way to get said credibility is to offer and give national exposure for a close, competitive competition that can be won by different competing teams over a number of years rather than dominated by one or two. GB/England have not won an Ashes series for 40 years and a world cup in almost the same amount of years. Australia win almost all with the rare win for NZ. The rest of the home nations and France are at about the same level as each other so the competition between them (as the euro cup will be) is close and the winner not so certain. However there would be no interest for a UK broadcaster without England (who are too strong for the euro nations and too weak for Aus/NZ). So a team of the players missing the cut for 4 nations or of under 23 years old for England could be used to provide an English presence until the others have become sufficiently strong.
Such a competition would be competitive and would help to gain some credibility at international level which is one of the things we severely lack as a sport. As for the amount of cash coming from TV for the rights, the tournament is being run and sponsored anyway so it's not as if it would be being concocted just for TV. Any money from TV rights however small would be a bonus therefore and would increase over time as the tournament and sport gained more credibility and support.