$10m to buy back club rugby rights

Rugby Australia’s former CEO Raelene Castle bought back its club rugby TV rights for $10m after they were originally offloaded for free.

Shute Shield TV rights are among the products Rugby Australia bought back

Former Rugby Australia CEO Raelene Castle bought back the club rugby TV rights after they were originally offloaded for free. Along with production costs, it is a move that could cost the code more than $10m.

The Weekend Australian can also reveal that the new Rugby Australia administration this week parted ways with broadcast strategists Shane Mattiske and Michael Tange, who were costing them $1m a year.

RA is without a broadcast deal beyond this year and it can be revealed that the organisation may incur costs of more than $10m in a club rugby broadcast agreement finalised earlier this year.

Castle, and her board, were determined to have a bumper club-to-Wallabies broadcast rights package to take to market.

Nick Fordham and John Murray held the rights to club rugby. Picture: Nikki Short

After hearing that Fox Sports (owned by News Corp, publisher of The Weekend Australian) was “kicking the tyres” and considering establishing a new domestic rugby product, Castle moved.

She instructed her broadcast strategists to secure a deal with Club Rugby TV and its state unions to strengthen their package.

This saw RA agree to pay Nick Fordham and John Murray, who owned the Club Rugby TV rights, $1.25m over the next five years for the matches that were once on 7mate.

Sydney Rugby Union was paying $330,000 a year in production costs for one game a week. Those costs were also taken up by RA for four years.

In what one rugby source described as a “good deal for the states and good deal for Sydney rugby”, NSW Rugby Union would be paid $1m by RA, as well as having production costs absorbed, for its content over four years.

Queensland Rugby Union is also understood to have secured top dollar for its games.

The Weekend Australian understands the overall agreement amounted to well over $10m for RA.

Under the agreement RA does not own the rights to the Shute Shield but secured the permission of the Sydney and NSW rugby unions, and the Queensland Rugby Union, to shop their premier club competitions to broadcasters, including a new combined competition featuring the top teams from the Shute Shield and Brisbane’s Hospital Cup.

But the lucrative agreement forged with NSW, Sydney Rugby Union and Queensland may not see the light of day with broadcast negotiations still up in the air.