Super Netball has been given a financial shot in the arm after announcing a new five-year broadcast rights deal which will see all games from the 2022 season onwards available on Foxtel platforms.
The move represents a shift away from free-to-air TV, with the Nine network to finish up its involvement with the league at the end of the upcoming season, starting on 1 May.
As part of the new deal, all games will be available to subscribers of Foxtel and its streaming app Kayo Sports. Two games each week during the regular season will be made available free of charge on Kayo, along with the entire finals series.
Diamonds international fixtures will also be available for free on the platform.
“This is a landmark deal for the sport and provides the foundation for Super Netball to grow and enhance its status as the best elite netball competition in the world,” the Netball Australia interim CEO, Ron Steiner, said.
‘’It also provides financial security that will enable netball’s member organisations to nurture what is Australia’s number one female team participation sport.
“Netball’s mission is to empower women and girls and connect communities, and the wide-ranging impact of this deal will drive those outcomes.”
The deal enables Super Netball, for the first time, to pay elite player salaries itself, enabling member organisations and clubs greater freedom to support and promote the grassroots game, the league said.
“There are many winners in this deal, and that includes the world’s best netball players who will enjoy contract security and some of the best conditions of any female athletes anywhere,” the Super Netball League Commission chair, Marina Go, said.
Fox Sports will undertake the production of all matches played in Australia from 2022 and develop new netball magazine shows as part of the deal.
The pay TV channel has recently come under fire for the quality of its production of W-League broadcasts, and several embarrassing glitches during live broadcasts have prompted calls for the auditor general to review Foxtel’s $40m grant for women’s sport.
The federal government gave another $10m to the Murdoch-controlled Foxtel last year to boost women’s and underrepresented sport, bringing to $40m the total taxpayer funding for the subscription TV service since 2017.
