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Six Nations will no longer be shown exclusively on free-to-air TV

The 2019 Six Nations was potentially one of the last entire editions of the tournament to be exclusively shown on UK terrestrial TV (Photo by Shaun Botterill/Getty Images)

The entire Six Nations championship will no longer be shown exclusively on free-to-air under a proposed £500m deal that will see CVC Capital Partners take a 15 per cent stake in the tournament which is currently shown in the UK by BBC and ITV under a five-year deal that ends in 2021.

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RugbyPass understands that a mixture of free-to-air and paid-for television exposure will be put in place in the UK, Ireland and France to enable CVC to maximise their involvement in Europe’s elite international competition. 

Crucially, the November internationals staged by the Six Nations countries would also be part of the deal with those games coming into the equation when the free-to-air element is negotiated.

Six Nations sources insist there is agreement across the board to bring this into play with the major Unions set to bank £100million each from the CVC deal, although Italy would receive a lower figure as they were last to join the competition. 

“The current agreement will be the last to involve the whole Six Nations tournament being shown on terrestrial television,” confirmed a leading Six Nations source to RugbyPass. “The exact details have yet to be negotiated but the whole deal could be sorted out quite quickly.”

(Continue reading below…)

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That kind of cash windfall, allied to a commitment to keep some matches free-to-air, has convinced the Six Nations administration to make this momentous decision and each of the Unions is currently considering the proposal from CVC, who already own a 27 per cent share of the English Premiership that netted the top 12 clubs around £20m each.

CVC’s grip on the sport is tightening with an offer of £120m for a stake in the PRO14 competition and they believe global rights sales from all three elements – Six Nations, Premiership and PRO14 – will generate the kind of funds to justify their support of rugby union.

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Alun Wyn Jones
Wales captain Alun Wyn Jones lifts the 2019 title (Photo by Getty Images)

The Six Nations board is expected to be in a position to forge ahead with the CVC proposal shortly. They believe keeping some of the matches for terrestrial television will help deflect some of the anger that the move is expected to generate. 

The threat of the Six Nations being lost to Sky or BT in the lead-up to the current terrestrial deal signed in 2016 resulted in petitions being started demanding that what is seen as one of the jewels of the sporting crown in Europe was not hidden behind a pay-wall.

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Flankly 1 hour ago
'Absolute madness': Clive Woodward rips into Borthwick in wake of NZ loss

Borthwick is supposed to be the archetypical conservative coach, the guy that might not deliver a sparkling, high-risk attacking style, but whose teams execute the basics flawlessly. And that's OK, because it can be really hard to beat teams that are rock solid and consistent in the rugby equivalent of "blocking and tackling".


But this is why the performance against NZ is hard to defend. You can forgive a conservative, back-to-basics team for failing to score tons of tries, because teams like that make up for it with reliability in the simple things. They can defend well, apply territorial pressure, win the set piece battles, and take their scoring chances with metronomic goal kicking, maul tries and pick-and-go goal line attacks.


The reason why the English rugby administrators should be on high alert is not that the English team looked unable to score tries, but that they were repeatedly unable to close out a game by executing basic, coachable skills. Regardless of how they got to the point of being in control of their destiny, they did get to that point. All that was needed was to be world class at things that require more training than talent. But that training was apparently missing, and the finger has to point at the coach.


Borthwick has been in the job for nearly two years, a period that includes two 6N programs and an RWC campaign. So where are the solid foundations that he has been building?

4 Go to comments
N
Nickers 1 hour ago
Scott Robertson responds to criticism over All Blacks' handling errors

Very poor understanding of what's going on and 0 ability to read. When I say playing behind the gain line you take this to mean all off-loads and site times we are playing in front of the gain line???


Every time we play a lot of rugby behind the gain line (for clarity, meaning trying to build an attack and use width without front foot ball 5m+ behind the most recent breakdown) we go backwards and turn the ball over in some way. Every time a player is tackled behind the most recent breakdown you need more and more people to clear out because your forwards have to go back around the corner, whereas opposition players can keep moving forward. Eventually you run out of either players to clear out or players to pass to and the result in a big net loss of territory and often a turnover. You may have witnessed that 20+ times in the game against England. This is a particularly dumb idea inside your own 40m which is where, for some reason, we are most likely to employ it.


The very best ABs teams never built an identity around attacking from poor positions. The DC era team was known for being the team that kicked the most. To engineer field position and apply pressure, and create broken play to counter attack. This current team is not differentiating between when a defence has lost it's structure and there are opportunities, and when they are completely set and there is nothing on. The reason they are going for 30 minute + periods in every game without scoring a single point, even against Japan and a poor Australian team, is because they are playing most of their rugby on the back foot in the wrong half.

43 Go to comments
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Nickers 1 hour ago
Scott Robertson responds to criticism over All Blacks' handling errors

I thought we made a lot of progress against that type of defence by the WC last year. Lots of direct running and punching holes rather than using width. Against that type of defence I think you have to be looking to kick on first phase when you have front foot ball which we did relatively successfully. We are playing a lot of rugby behind the gain line at the moment. They are looking for those little interchanges for soft shoulders and fast ball or off loads but it regularly turns into them battering away with slow ball and going backwards, then putting in a very rushed kick under huge pressure.


JB brought that dimension when he first moved into 12 a couple of years ago but he's definitely not been at his best this year. I don't know if it is because he is being asked to play a narrow role, or carrying a niggle or two, but he does not look confident to me. He had that clean break on the weekend and stood there like he was a prop who found himself in open space and didn't know what to do with the ball. He is still a good first phase ball carrier though, they use him a lot off the line out to set up fast clean ball, but I don't think anyone is particularly clear on what they are supposed to do at that point. He was used really successfully as a second playmaker last year but I don't think he's been at that role once this year. He is a triple threat player but playing a very 1 dimensional role at the moment. He and Reiko have been absolutely rock solid on defence which is why I don't think there will be too much experimentation or changes there.

43 Go to comments
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