So much clean air.

@ The Select Few

It’s alright, the ffa have got it fixed for next season - McDonalds Safe Smoke games!! available in red or yellow theyre the perfect win-win-win ... ultras will flock to games and families will be safe because it’s safe smoke see and the naughty media can’t write horrid things about our games ‘cos they’re legal. Gallop and Lowe will prove you can please all the people

Meanwhile the Man Utd game managed to get 145k on SBS

But who wants to watch a league where the same teams win each season and how many can even find SBS?

Don’t forget you get more clean air at 11.30pm, maybe we need midnight games?

Yet there are calls to abandon the salary cap 

Whats that got to do with anything. 

Wollongong Blacktown 10k
Sunshine Coast v Redlands 1,233 although figures were above 100 all game so no idea why so low. 

What were they shown on? 10k watched the gong?

FB.

Yeti FC broadcasted a game on a Nepalese channel. It received its own sponsorship from CFG, received its own article and got over 18k on FB and its own article on the match in Nepal. Shit. 

Also it got 300 views on Twitter.

#TVratings Saturday #ALeague #FoxSports
#WSWvWEL 23k

What are FOXTEL doing to the coverage?

Foxtel is spending more than it's worth at the moment can't blame them for what FFA has done to their investment.

It's even more worrying that the Perth game's ratings would've been a fraction of the WSW, considering it went up against the premier league.

Nice contract - take this money and spend it what you want just do exactly as we say about scheduling. You don't even need to spend the money on A-League.

Would be interest to hear Foxtel on all this... I'd be fuming if I were them.

Here's the thing, 

FFA can't do anything now except backpackers in Wookie Suits and "The Chase"

The APFCA (and CFG in particular) have taken the long view and are turning the screws by not bringing in any big names.

Jettisoning Timmy at first chance after they got their sky-blue kit removed the only 'face' the FFA had.

And next, when it comes to deciding how much an Independent A-League is worth, the FFA are going to have less bargaining power the longer it goes on.

How long before FOX start pushing the "Independent ' Cause ?

Foxtel ARPU is something like $93/subscriber/month, no doubt its under pressure and heading south as a result.

The HAL costs them $4.7m/month (assuming $56m/12 month) so based on the ARPU and costs they need 50,173 subscribers to break even.

Given that number, plus you can add in some advertising, even with the current lowly viewing figures the HAL is making a decent profit for Fox.

I wouldn’t like to guess what the number of subscribers is purely for the HAL, I’m certainly one of them (no HAL, no Fox), but I’d say it’s way, way more than 50,000

If there's 100,000 subscribers who only want HAL, why don't they watch it ?

@ Bugalugs

I recon they are. The viewing figures are between 25,000-50,000/match or around 150,000-200,000 per weekend; with a few overs on that but it won’t be the same people watching each game will it. A few will watch every game but most will watch one or two plus plenty will be at live games each weekend.

Last seasons GF averaged 367k, I’d say about half are regulars which is 180,000 or worth $200m+ a year to Fox.

The maths is very simple - Fox are making a decent profit out of the HAL but won’t be impressed non the less. More viewers = more subscribers = more profit which they will desperately want.

Why are people turning off this season is a good question, you would hope Fox give a damn with 5 years to go as they’re the only ones the ffa listen to.

I reckon all your guesses are wrong, and there's no way there's that many HAL-only subscribers.  But, I've no proof.

@ Burgalugs.

Can’t argue with you on that, they are just guesses but earlier posts saying Fox are losing money had no guesses, just opinions.

Another way of looking at it, is what number of subscribers would make Fox feel comfortable shelling out $56m/year?

Personally I don’t think the HAL Fox numbers will pick up significantly until they win back the EPL rights, which is another year away.

One of the points often missed is the churn of subscribers which is about 11% the last I read.  In Sydney for example Fox need to find nearly 70k new subscribers annually just to maintain their revenue from the Sydney market.  New product and variety of product is essential for them.

Well you could do that with a second division. Like what PlayStation did. Sponsor the NPL and dominate the juniors market and their families.

@GyFox

Correct. And products like the A league are meant to act as anchors keeping consumers loyal to the product loyal to the service from Foxtel. So they’ll be pissed with football right now, if people disengage they’ll cancel contracts and they’re not easy to get back when they’ve walked

And that will be why they are chasing a cut of the BBL.  They're going hard and will pay big bucks for it.

The idiots at Foxtel HQ should have thought of that before demanding kickoff times that are inconvenient for families and expensive oversized stadiums for A-League clubs. 

I doubt very much that Foxtel have any idea how many people subscribe to their sports channels based on a particular sport.As much as I like to watch football,I also watch other sports.So If there was no HAL,I dont know that i would get rid of sports channels.
They have never asked me why i have Foxsports.
Maybe they monitor channels we watch and know every detail of our viewing habits.
Maybe there is also a blocking component.Keeping sports off competitors channels limits leakage away from Foxtel.
When they lost the EPL,they responded by getting individual channels of some EPL clubs.
For the number of viewers involved it seemed a waste of time.But clearly there is an issue of being seen to be the premier sports provider for viewers,so having as much coverage of sports as possible is important.Otherwise how are they different from everyone else?
That's why they show as much content as possible.Every interest group,no matter how small is of value to them,because if you only have an interest in say alpine skiing,its a way of keeping you subscribed to other content.To a skiing enthusiast getting foxsports to watch skiing,knowing you can get AFL or NRL may be the tipping point.Without it the skiing enthusiast might say,im not that interested in AFL or NRL to get a whole Foxsports package.
So the bottom line is HAL,EPL,FFA Cup and eventually even Div 2 NPL are all important to Foxsports.It helps build subscribers and keep them.
Keeping those sports off competitors channels is also important.

You are 100% correct. Particularly as those who want to watch via Satellite have to suffer a $25 entertainment fee for shit they'll never watch

$55 a month minimum for SD sport

Fox need to work hard to ensure it has a range of sports content to justify it. They know if they ever had a "just sports" option they would lose a lot of money

I still think a good selling point for a second div would be if there were regular games on weeknights.
Foxsports has been trying to push football codes to play weeknight games ,but tue and wed has been a bridge too far.Even thurs is stretch.
The FFA Cup showed people will watch games on these nights and what live sports content do Foxsports currently have on tues and weds?
Also I dont think overlap between codes is as big an issue as some make out.
Last night we had overlap on two ACL games,while Bill and Bozz was on another channel.why is not that big a deal? because different people have different preferences and those that like all three shows can watch by recording some for watching later.Times have changed and maybe Foxsports are more comfortable with this than people realise.Maybe FFA will catch on soon that clean air ,the ever shrinking window,is not that big a deal.

I'd like to see a dedicated 24 hour football channel like the other codes get. Plenty of content such as A League, second tier, youth league, FFA cup games (including preliminaries) and even the NPL

The W League and Matildas should be on a 24 hour womens sport channel instead of having womens sport scattered across different channels. Its too hard to know if they are even going to show it let alone where