Nick
Years ago
The ABA and A-league - Need Free To Air Coverage
The ABC have shown a lot of "less popular" sport over the years. They can do this because they are not a commercial station and the less popular sports like WNBL, SANFL and Lawn Bowls because they do not demand a lot of advertising and the ABC can afford to show them. Why doesn't the ABC show some ABA? Channel 31 crossed my mind but it's so hard to pick them up on your TV let alone a watchable picture that it would be rather pointless. Perhaps one game a week. Admittedly there's not very much interest in the ABA but like I said, the ABC does not need popular sport and DO show unpopular sport. I know it's perfectly easy to head down to your local stadium and watch a game but I'm thinking from more of a "get basketball in the public eye and generate interest" point of view.
If there's one sporting competition that should have some free-to-air coverage and doesn't is the A-League. As we all know the A-League has become extremely popular in Australia drawing an average crowd of 16,000 in 2007 and they are still growing. To give you an idea of how much the crowds are growing in the A-leagues inaugural year in 2004 the average crowd was 10,000. It's not unusual to see a crowd of 50,000 in Melbourne! Foxtel are currently showing every A-League game so they obviously understand how much interest there is in Australia's best football competition. If free-to-air stations are interested in showing the NBL then surely they are interested in the A-League!
