BREAKING NEWS ON THIS STORY
http://m.smh.com.au/sport/cricket/2ue-to-air-ashes-as-abc-loses-stranglehold-20131003-2uxfm.html
The ABC will lose its exclusive rights to Test cricket in Australia, with radio stations 2UE and 3AW to cover the game alongside the national broadcaster starting with this summer's Ashes series.
In an historic move by Cricket Australia aimed at broadening the audience of cricket's traditional format its broadcast rights team is deep in negotiations with Fairfax Radio, which owns major commercial channels in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane as well as stations in Perth.
And in another development that leaves the ABC frozen out of covering domestic cricket, Triple M has picked up the rights to the Twenty20 Big Bash League.
Four months after cricket's record $590 million television deal was finalised - Channel Nine retained Test and other international cricket in Australia for the next five years while Network Ten acquired the BBL - talks to secure radio's equivalent for the next five years have crept into the start of the domestic season.
CA's foray into commercial radio has been a well-guarded secret for weeks and has been made amid administrators' urgency to maintain the relevancy of Test cricket and take it to new markets as well as a drive to further boost revenue. The ABC's broadcasting of Tests at home and abroad has been an institution since it covered its first match, between Australia and England in 1924, and its exclusivity in the radio sphere has rarely been broken.
By adding commercial AM and FM partners for Tests and the BBL respectively, cricket joins the country's other leading codes the AFL, which has games in Melbourne called by the ABC, 3AW, SEN and Triple M, and the National Rugby League, whose radio rights in Sydney are held by the ABC, 2GB and Triple M.
Cricket's revamped radio and digital line-up has not gone down well, however, at the ABC, where there is a belief that CA has cheapened the national broadcaster's contribution to Test cricket over more than 80 years.
Grandstand's team of callers includes the iconic Jim Maxwell, veteran commentator Drew Morphett and the colourful former Test spinner Kerry O'Keeffe.
A key reason for discontent at the ABC is CA's refusal in negotiating the new agreement to allow the public broadcaster to live stream international cricket online as it has done previously. CA is keeping the digital market to itself, announcing in June it had partnered with Nine for a $60 million digital rights alliance that will have televised games streamed live on smartphone, tablets and its own website.
CA's site and apps will also carry live feeds of the BBL and audio streaming of the ABC and Fairfax Radio coverage of matches. The ABC retains Test cricket, covering it simultaneously with 2UE and 3AW, and limited-overs international cricket but has lost the rights to call Sheffield Shield, Ryobi Cup and BBL matches under the terms of the new deal, which is yet to be announced. Triple M will build on its sports portfolio by covering some of the the expanded local T20 tournament but not in a traditional ball-by-ball format.
Effectively sidelined and reduced to a reporting capacity in domestic cricket, the ABC is expected to look to increase its calling of other sports, including football's A-League, in the summer months.
The new broadcasting arrangements leave the Shield and the Ryobi Cup in radio silence, although the one-day tournament is back on free-to-air television after CA paid Nine $800,000 to have it shown on its high-definition channel Gem.
The brokering of CA's new deals has been led by its broadcast rights and regulatory manager Libby Owens. Ben Amarfio, CA's digital media and communications general manager, is also understood to have been involved.
He was previously general manager at Triple M owner Southern Cross Austereo and before that, while in a senior role at the AFL, was behind the striking of a tiered radio broadcasting rights package that ensured every game was covered by one of its radio partners.
A spokesman for CA said it did not comment on ongoing broadcast discussions. Representatives from Fairfax Radio, the ABC and Southern Cross Austereo also declined to comment
