Why the BBC and ITV might be about to drop the ball for coverage of Six Nations

It is the clashes on the pitch upon which most Six Nations fans will be focused for the next two months, but in the broadcasting boardrooms and back corridors, a battle is about to be fought that could prove even more consequential. This year marks the final year of ITV’s and BBC’s joint agreement to show the men’s Six Nations in the United Kingdom, with the free-to-air future of the competition now in doubt – and a complex rights landscape to navigate.

A report on the Monday morning of the opening match-week only served to inflame the debate. Suggestions that TNT Sports was set to take the rights to the competition were, at least for now, erroneous and premature, but that did not prevent an eruption of public ill-feeling. Take the Six Nations off free-to-air television? Let the death knells sound for the sport.

As ever, the situation is nowhere near that straightforward. Firstly, the story was untrue – the tender process has not even officially opened, all conversations (of which there are many) for now discursive and very much ongoing. Much will happen between now and then. Plans are also being put in place to go to market on the new “Nations Cup” that will redefine the July and November international windows – a bundling of the rights to this and the Six Nations, who operate the new competition with southern Hemisphere counterparts Sanzaar, is a possibility.

Just days after Scott Young, senior vice-president for WBD Sports Europe, confirmed TNT’s interest in showing the tournament, the channel was briefing that its involvement would be “very challenging”, particularly around Welsh and Irish rights which are given greater protection.

The UK Government last year resisted calls to add the Six Nations to the “Crown Jewels” list of sporting events that must be shown live on free-to-air television. The Rugby World Cup final is the only rugby union property currently on the list. Yet a total abandonment of terrestrial stations feels unlikely; some have speculated that the Six Nations may use the threat to extract more from an ITV bid.

It may be that the BBC are totally out of the running. At a time where streaming services, non-linear media and the fragmentation of popular culture have eroded the television event, live sport stands as something of an outlier. It therefore possesses huge value to those that show it – but as streamers such as Netflix, Amazon and others increase their involvement, it is getting harder and harder for non-subscription services to compete.

The then director of BBC Sport Barbara Slater sounded the alarm in 2023: “Sports rights in the UK have more than doubled in the past decade,” she explained. “The BBC’s income in real terms has gone down 30 per cent. It is incredibly difficult for the BBC to maintain, across a range of sports, the expectations of those governing bodies.”

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Some have also wondered whether the national broadcaster still has the same priorities. Formerly sports editor at The Times and Daily Mail, Alex Kay-Jelski has replaced Slater after overseeing the successful British editorial expansion at The Athletic, which was sold to the New York Times for $550m (£400m) in 2022. Bold calls like the decision not to renew Gary Lineker’s Match of the Day contract have hit the headlines, but Kay-Jelski is also understood to have made changes to the operation behind the scenes.

The BBC has missed out on the radio rights to TalkSport for this summer’s British and Irish Lions tour; it seems likely that it will send a limited crew to Australia, perhaps only for the three Tests, to ensure some coverage of another prized rugby property. Sky Sports has long since had its arms around the live TV rights to the tours – its renewal for 2025 comes as a surprise in the broadcaster’s wider withdrawal from the sport, but speaks to its enduring value.

Sky had come close to taking the Six Nations rights in 2015 before the BBC and ITV joined forces, and was also connected with a bid in 2020; insiders suggest that an offer is unlikely this time around. Yet it speaks to the fact that this entire conversation is far from new – Sky screened all of England’s internationals at Twickenham between 1996 and 2002, only electing not to tender for the new, all-inclusive Six Nations television contract after learning that the competition’s committee was not prepared to award it to a non-terrestrial station.

That position is not quite as strong now, yet executives are fully appreciative of the cultural capital they would lose were even portions of the tournament to be paywalled. As ever, it is a matter of weighing up reach versus revenue, but the stumble-upon value of prime television real estate is significant. Rugby remains an engaging sport – as continuing high viewership in the Six Nations and World Cup most certainly prove. England’s Premiership has also recently reported significant growth in interest, particularly in Gen Z with almost a million new fans aged between 18 and 34. These are encouraging noises.

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To sever the connection to terrestrial television at this juncture would therefore feel like a colossal misstep with adult player numbers still dwindling in many territories. TNT was highly encouraged by its viewing figures during the Autumn Nations Series, but anecdotally the November Tests did not land with the public in the way a top-class competition should. Handling the relationship with private equity investor CVC Capital Partners, which own a 14.25 per cent stake in the competition but has a different outlook and objectives, is key within all of this.

Cricket has been down this road and will be pointed to as an example. Sky’s partnership with the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) may have taken the coverage of a complex game to new heights, but a generation lost easy access to the sport. It took the invention of a new format and competition to return cricket to regular free-to-air broadcasting; the ructions and ramifications of the Hundred cut deep into the county game.

In a twist of fate, it is a former ECB chief leading these current discussions. Things ended messily for Tom Harrison in cricket amid controversial bonuses (perhaps the RFU should have a chat with him) and questions over the handling of a number of issues, but the experienced executive’s appeal to the Six Nations was obvious when appointed two years ago. A heavy hitter in the rights world from his days at IMG, Harrison is fully aware of the landscape.

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“I think in any sporting environment, particularly a journey of development, visibility is really important,” Harrison told me last year. “The free-to-air space is all about balancing revenue – when you’re looking at sport as a whole. It’s about revenue reach and relevance and balancing those things.

“In cricket, we moved it back towards free-to-air, we took free-to-air back into the space. Rugby’s got a huge free-to-air component to it, particularly the men’s Six Nations, and the Women’s Six Nations as well. We understand the role that that plays in taking the game to new fans. To make it available is really important going forward.”

There are some within rugby that see heading up the Six Nations as a comfortable, cushy post. It is a golden goose – while there are some challenges, the key is to keep it laying. It is partly for this reason that discussions over further expansion or a radical revamp have not hugely progressed. Why would one tear up a format that works so well and gives the sport much-needed cut through?

The heads of domestic leagues have agonised for years over how to take a slice of the Six Nations pie, recognising the huge number of “rugby fans” who tune in each year for this single competition. But a great many of these will be itinerant sports watchers, dipping in and out when schedules allow – a bit of Wimbledon in the summer, an Olympics every four years, a big boxing fight or two. Only football, really, has year-round prominence in the cultural consciousness; for the rest, a spot on the first page of the TV guide is of significant value.

So why risk losing this one period of annual appeal? As the next few weeks will show, rugby will always dazzle in the shop window – to pull the shutters down would feel a grave mistake.