Sky have announced that they have secured exclusive broadcasting rights for Super League until 2021.



[urlhttp://www1.skysports.com/rugby-union/news/12173/9140875/sky-sports-secures-six-long-term-rights-agreements-across-six-different-sports[/url



Theres been nothing mentioned about how much its for, but the cynic in me doubts it's a huge improvement on the current deal. A shame considering the recent World Cup. It would have been nice to see the game on terrestrial tv and accessible for the masses.

Don't care. Will be nice to see the championship back on sky sports, although maybe it is only the end of season play off games.

Catalan home games on the red button is the best thing sky could have done, so well done to them gaining that.

I'm concerned that the RFL has rushed into this rather than waited to see if they could maximise the deal through a bidding war between Sky & BT Sport.

weren't Catalan games on Free to view TV in France last year?



If you then take into account Premier sports losing the Championship, that's Two different TV platforms that rugby League will no longer be on I'm not sure that's a good thing.



SKY will continue to pretend the Challenge cup doesn't exist and that the Magic Weekend is the second biggest day in the RL calendar after the Grand Final. Plus there is no announcement of SKY even touching the next world cup.....



Whats Game changing about the deal i'm not sure? ......maybe they have agreed that having the Superleague show on at 2.30am on Monday morning on BBC2 north isnt the best time slot and they are moving it forward an hour in the hope to get over a hundred viewers...?



either way its a far cry from when BT anounced a £152 million quid deal for Unions club rugby

Sporting life claim the deal is worth in excess of 200 million.

Catalans games were on free tv last year, and will be with the new sky deal - half the reason they agreed I imagine is because they won't have to actually do anything - French tv will record it, they'll pick up the transmission and dub the commentators over it. Good for supporters if the sky game is dull (more choice) good for them cos it costs nothing and good for Catalans as they will have exposure on both sides of the channel.



Premier sports, will lose the "super league 2" rights I imagine, but still have the nrl ... I'd be surprised if they lost that many customers over it.



The deal with sky has nothing to do with when the bbc, who own virtually no rights to show the sport (and would be incredibly foolish to bid for any sport with tax payers money) - an improved showing at the World Cup may see a better slot, but that's another deal for another day.



Chris Irvine just said on twitter that the 2016-2021 deal (aka the actual new one) is worth over £200m - so your right, it is a long way from £152m

£200 million? Awesome. If premier decide to show the third tier it would be even better.

You know the RFL has rushed into it? You know what discussions they have had?

Quote tigertot="tigertot"You know the RFL has rushed into it? You know what discussions they have had?'" No I don't, hence my use of the word "concerned". HTH But according to the "Loverugbyleague" website no other discussions were held: www.loverugbyleague.com/news_141 ... eague.html If true that has to be a real concern. How does the RFL know it has the best deal without testing the market? I'd be interested in Ian Lenegan's (amongst others) thoughts on this.

Quote tigertot="tigertot"You know the RFL has rushed into it? You know what discussions they have had?'" No I don't, hence my use of the word "concerned". HTH But according to the "Loverugbyleague" website no other discussions were held: www.loverugbyleague.com/news_141 ... eague.html If true that has to be a real concern. How does the RFL know it has the best deal without testing the market? I'd be interested in Ian Lenegan's (amongst others) thoughts on this.

However, from the VT thread on this it would seem that the new deal is a significant improvement on the existing deal up from £127m to £200m.

So maybe my concerns were ill-founded.

Time will tell.

Big raps for Nigel Wood. What with the WC, the new Sky deal & the sponsorship we will be in danger of losing him to tennis.