Nine, Ten team up for cricket TV bid

VENERABLE cricket broadcaster the Nine Network is understood to have joined with rejuvenated rival Ten to bid for a new five-year contract to broadcast the game.

Cricket Australia closed bids for its multi-million dollar rights at 5pm yesterday, ending months of negotiations that include finding funds to meet new player pay terms that were thrashed out in a bitter dispute in 2017.

Cricket Australia needs about $150 million annually to pay for all wages and funding promised, it is believed.

No immediate outcome is expected, with Cricket Australia aiming to announce a winner ahead of the next cricket season in October.

Last year Cricket Australia chief executive James Sutherland said the association had received more interest in the rights this round than ever before.

Seven is rumoured to be looking at a bid, but faces the dilemma of renewing its Tennis Australia deal after the as- sociation called for broadcasters to bid for the Australian Open and other popular tournaments last week.

Foxtel has reportedly placed a bid but if the pay TV broadcaster is successful, it will have to share the rights with a free-to-air network.

Financial analysts at UBS last year urged Nine, which has broadcast Test cricket for almost four decades, to end its long-term cricket coverage due to estimated $30-40 million yearly losses.

Nine is now understood to have combined with Ten, which is backed by US broadcast giant CBS, to share the cost of a cricket rights bid.

In 2013, Nine outbid Network Ten for the rights to broadcast international cricket for five years, forking out $450 million for the privilege, while Ten received the Big Bash League. Cricket Australia then secured an overall deal worth $590 million for the domestic rights. Ten won the right to broadcast the domestic Twenty20 competitions for five years.