Hi William

Although the game has probably got more in terms of hard cash from Sky, we now have all our eggs in 1 basket and IMO, we would have been better off with the CC shown on a terrestrial channel.

A couple of hundred thousand viewers on Sky is not exactly appealing to the masses.

Hi Richard

Didn't soccer grow crowds again last season to nrl levels?

I have no idea what the viewing figures are for the highlights of the 2 leagues.
But for the live games SL gets roughly 30% higher viewing figures than the AP.

, s
That may or may not be true, my point was that the Aviva rugby is seen by many more people each week on TV than Superleague is. If you're trying to sell your product, surely you want as many people as possible to see your product?

I know you're a troll so I shouldn't respond, but you have the viewing figures for the SL Show vs the RU highlights package I assume? Even though it is ghettoised in most of the country, the SL show still gets very reasonable figures in the north of England so there is little reason to think the RU equivalent, shown at similar time slots, would be significantly more popular.

How do you know that the AP is seen by many more people each week on TV if you don't know what the viewing figures are?

If you do know what the viewing figures are then why are you pretending you don't know them?

The only broadcaster in the UK for whom audience figures carry little weight is the BBC. It has a certain "guaranteed" income plus anything extra it gets via programme sales and merchendising etc.
All the rest rely on advertising and/or subscription charges.
To that end the rate card and socio-economic groups come to the fore allied to viewing figures.
If you look at the advertising during programmes you will see who the advertisers are aiming at. Although not an exact science it is pretty well on the mark regarding interest and returns.
If you look at the adverts say in Skys coverage of RU and SL I would suggest the mix maybe somewhat different ,although Sky seem to believe that RU interests most RL followers and vice versa. The rate cards will be different even if the same advert is shown. Take for example a Range Rover, it might be of interest to some followers of RL but outside the financial range of most , but probably within the range of most who would follow Union. The advertising rate would be dictated by potential returns so even if the audience for League exceeds union by double, the actual return could be less for the advertiser but the rate paid less than for advertising for a bigger market share for them in the Union slot.
Also note that Premier Sports shuts down on Saturday afternoons whilst Mo & Ron Balls game is on. They know they will not get an audience at all so no advertiser will pay either.
So whilst audience figures matter, they are only a part of the story. Just think that the NFL can fill Wembley and Sky promote the game to the hilt along with C4 but what is the advertising rate and who actually advertises? IMO it's a rubbish game to watch in its current form but then a sport that has to tell the audience what is happening each time is hitting it's socio-economic groups quite well I would suggest.

I still think we should try to get ITV or channel 4 to show some games after Sky have had their pick you never know it might work

Blah Blah Blah

Is Leaguefan still pushing the "league is only watched by poor people" argument?