Tactix goal keep Jane Watson, left, and Mystics shooter Grace Nweke are two of the biggest stars of the ANZ Premiership. Photo: © Photosport Ltd 2024 www.photosport.nz
Over three-quarters of a million New Zealanders have tuned in to watch the weekly free-to-air ANZ Premiership games, since live netball returned to TVNZ for the first time in 13 years.
In 2011, Netball New Zealand ended its 17-year association with TVNZ after signing a broadcast deal with Sky TV.
This year, ANZ Premiership Saturday afternoon games were broadcast live on Sky Sport and shown live and free-to-air on TVNZ 2 and its streaming service TVNZ+.
Nearly 770,000 Kiwis have made the most of the 12 free-to-air games shown so far, with the season about three-quarters complete.
The ANZ Premiership has reached more than 714,000 viewers on TVNZ 2, with an additional 55,450 accounts on TVNZ+.
Netball New Zealand chief commercial officer David Cooper said they were very happy with the numbers.
"Absolutely, I think when we embarked on having TVNZ as part of our broadcast portfolio for 2024 we were looking for that wider engagement out to the fans of netball.
"And I think what we've seen is a rise across the board - not only have we got that audience coming through, but our engagement across social, our attendances and even our offshore streaming platform, the numbers have gone up year on year, and quite significantly in some cases."
Netball New Zealand's 2023 annual report said last year's ANZ Premiership Sky TV viewership was over one million viewers.
At this point, the Sky numbers were tracking towards being their best year for quite a long time, Cooper said.
Part of the challenge had been getting the message out to all corners of the community that some netball was free-to-air again, in an age when so much media content was available across multiple platforms.
"I think that's also part of the excitement we've got as we head towards 2025.
"There is a little bit of a not slow burn, but a burn process that goes on to get to the point of the awareness lifting. And obviously we're at a crunch time now in the season with some really exciting games.
"But next year, the fans will know that we're there again and we will want to see another lift again.
"So it's exciting where it goes, and it's supporting our fans that are watching through Sky as well, because just the growth and awareness that goes on by being out in that free-to-air world is going to help all the areas that we're measuring the game on."
All ANZ Premiership Saturday afternoon games have been broadcast live on Sky Sport, TVNZ 2 and its streaming service TVNZ+. Photo: Aaron Gillions
In May, Netball New Zealand (NNZ) and Sky TV announced they had agreed to a one-year extension to their existing broadcast partnership.
NNZ also entered into a further 12-month partnership with TVNZ, continuing this year's initiative for every Saturday game to be shown free-to-air.
From next year those matches will be broadcast live exclusively on TVNZ, while Sky will get it on delay. The weekly free-to-air game will be self-produced by NNZ and packaged up for broadcast.
"We're working on that at the moment, as to what that might look like and be different, but a real emphasis on the innovation piece into the game, which is not to take away at all from the way our matches are produced at the moment, but it just gives us the chance to trial and play with some new things as well.
"We're also going to see some rules during the men's series between the Mystics and Stars, where they are trialling new rules like the two-point shot, that we're really interested in how they play out and what role they could play in the future of the ANZ Premiership."
The domestic season is being cut from three rounds to two next year and Cooper believed that would ramp up the dial on the teams and in turn be a more exciting watch.
"I think that's what we expect, that more intensity will be brought. The current three-round format does mean teams can have several losses. Therefore, the intensity of two rounds means it's all go from round one in terms of performance."
In terms of participation at the community level, Netball New Zealand was happy with what they were seeing.
Cooper said early membership returns this year showed there was growth at the grassroots level, "and we've seen increases in Auckland, which is always the market that moves the dial the most".