Rabo pull the plug

[juanca]

Just announced that Rabo will end sponsorship of Pro 12 from next year. 3 years into 4 year agreement due to focus on the Irish market.

[Rogocoko]

Whats the bets BT Sport sponsor it?!

[simonno6]

Celtic League Rugby will be confident of attracting a new title sponsor especially following the announcement in May that Sky Sports have agreed a four year deal to broadcast 33 live matches each season.

This deal is due to commence at the start of season 2014-15, and will run alongside the continued terrestrial screening of matches.

http://www.independent.ie/sport/rabodir ... 22682.html

They'll hope to pull in a bigger sponsorship deal given the Sky deal surely?

Maybe too rich for Rabo?

[rooster]

Whats the bets BT Sport sponsor it?!

Or Heineken ?

[Dave Cahill]

Celtic League Rugby will be confident of attracting a new title sponsor especially following the announcement in May that Sky Sports have agreed a four year deal to broadcast 33 live matches each season.

This deal is due to commence at the start of season 2014-15, and will run alongside the continued terrestrial screening of matches.

http://www.independent.ie/sport/rabodir ... 22682.html

They'll hope to pull in a bigger sponsorship deal given the Sky deal surely?

Maybe too rich for Rabo?

The opposite would be the case.

A PTV deal like with Sky limits the exposure a brand gets because the viewing figures are always lower and the Pro12 has not, as yet, announced any FTA terrestrial coverage for 14-15.

Add in to that the fact that the three big teams in the area its interested in are now sponsored by a competitor (who are quite aggressive in protecting their sponsorship deals) and you have two big problems for Rabo

[simonno6]

so there are less Sky subscribers in the UK than there are TG4 / S4C / BBC Alba etc... viewers in the respective countries?

Surely the league will have a higher profile with Sky?

[mikerob]

An AP game or HEC group game on Sky would typically only get about 100k or so viewers in the UK.

A Pro12 game on BBC NI or BBC Wales gets more viewers than that.

Rugby on pay TV doesn't have big viewing figures. Up to a point, Sky doesn't really care if you watch the game or not as long as you pay your subscription. Advertising provides less than 10% of Sky's revenues.

Rugby (and other sports) gives them a different demographic than football. The dedicated fan will sign up, and the more casual fan will stay subscribing as it is another thing they would watch.

[Dave Cahill]

so there are less Sky subscribers in the UK than there are TG4 / S4C / BBC Alba etc... viewers in the respective countries?

Surely the league will have a higher profile with Sky?

It will have a higher profile if Sky swing their marketing muscle behind it, it won't if they don't Just being on Sky won't do anything in and of itself.

The assumption that every sky sports subscriber will watch the league is erroneous, they won't. Sky don't release the number of subscribers to their sports channels, but the general assumption is around 3/4 of their subscribers take Sky Sports, which gives them a total UK&I number of about 7.5 million. The FTA channels that broadcast the league in the UK and Ireland have a reach of about 66 million! That is of course because the terrestrial TV stations have pretty much total saturation of the UK and Ireland so its misleading - they don't all have dishes! But the numbers are vastly greater notwithstanding

How much will the pro12 interest people in England? Almost not at all I'd wager. I'd say it'll get figures similar to the Currie Cup or the ITM Cup at best.

[Dave Cahill]

An AP game or HEC group game on Sky would typically only get about 100k or so viewers in the UK.

A Pro12 game on BBC NI or BBC Wales gets more viewers than that.

Zebre vs Leinster, on a Sunday afternoon in April, one of the least attractive games at certainly the least attractive time slot got 96.200 viewers on RTE2

The week previous, Munster vs Leinster, got 283,000 on RTE2

[mikerob]

How much will the pro12 interest people in England? Almost not at all I'd wager. I'd say it'll get figures similar to the Currie Cup or the ITM Cup at best.

Currie Cup gets about 15k-25k. ITM Cup doesn't register in the top 10 but these games are funny times in Europe while Currie Cup is weekend afternoons.

[mikerob]

An AP game or HEC group game on Sky would typically only get about 100k or so viewers in the UK.

A Pro12 game on BBC NI or BBC Wales gets more viewers than that.

Zebre vs Leinster, on a Sunday afternoon in April, one of the least attractive games at certainly the least attractive time slot got 96.200 viewers on RTE2

The week previous, Munster vs Leinster, got 283,000 on RTE2

In comparison, London Welsh v Leicester, Sunday afternoon, got 88k on Sky in the UK.

Ulster v Scarlets Pro12 SF got 111k on S4C.

[Dave Cahill]

The point of the figures is to demonstrate that from a commercial and promotional point of view, a PTV only television deal is not attractive to sponsors. At this point in time, the only coverage for 14-15 is on Sky. That may change, but thats the situation at the moment, and until and unless terrestrial comes on board, finding a sponsor will be difficult.

[Dave Cahill]

How much will the pro12 interest people in England? Almost not at all I'd wager. I'd say it'll get figures similar to the Currie Cup or the ITM Cup at best.

Currie Cup gets about 15k-25k. ITM Cup doesn't register in the top 10 but these games are funny times in Europe while Currie Cup is weekend afternoons.

I didn't realise that the CC was quite that low tbh.

[rooster]

The point of the figures is to demonstrate that from a commercial and promotional point of view, a PTV only television deal is not attractive to sponsors. At this point in time, the only coverage for 14-15 is on Sky. That may change, but thats the situation at the moment, and until and unless terrestrial comes on board, finding a sponsor will be difficult.

I would say that BBC in its various regions will still be keen on the PRO12 as they were pleasantly surprised at the BBCNI figure which if I remember correctly were around 130k on average.
The teams got very little cash from BBC but it raised the profile and aided in getting sponsorship in Ulster and I'm sure others had the same benefit.

[Dave Cahill]

The point of the figures is to demonstrate that from a commercial and promotional point of view, a PTV only television deal is not attractive to sponsors. At this point in time, the only coverage for 14-15 is on Sky. That may change, but thats the situation at the moment, and until and unless terrestrial comes on board, finding a sponsor will be difficult.

I would say that BBC in its various regions will still be keen on the PRO12 as they were pleasantly surprised at the BBCNI figure which if I remember correctly were around 130k on average.
The teams got very little cash from BBC but it raised the profile and aided in getting sponsorship in Ulster and I'm sure others had the same benefit.

oh absolutely, just saying, as things stand...

The Pro12 has to get the terrestrial sorted super quickly

[simonokeeffe]

Guinnes were big sponsors of UK rugby (on Sky Sports) and Irish Rugby and theyre a cross border brand so a chance they may come in

[rooster]

Guinnes were big sponsors of UK rugby (on Sky Sports) and Irish Rugby and theyre a cross border brand so a chance they may come in

Could also be an overall Diagio sponsorship as they are pushing whiskey pretty strongly in Italy at present as well

[The Doc]

Guinnes were big sponsors of UK rugby (on Sky Sports) and Irish Rugby and theyre a cross border brand so a chance they may come in

Could also be an overall Diagio sponsorship as they are pushing whiskey pretty strongly in Italy at present as well

Won't happen until Irish Govt decide what it's doing about drink sponsorship of sporting events

[rooster]

Guinnes were big sponsors of UK rugby (on Sky Sports) and Irish Rugby and theyre a cross border brand so a chance they may come in

Could also be an overall Diagio sponsorship as they are pushing whiskey pretty strongly in Italy at present as well

Won't happen until Irish Govt decide what it's doing about drink sponsorship of sporting events

Didn't realise the anti drink lobby had struck down with you as well

[The Doc]

Didn't realise the anti drink lobby had struck down with you as well

Labour party are pushing for a ban - we could call it the "G League" - or "D Cup" for Diageo