Chris Rattue: High Sky prices need the chop in TV sports overhaul

Boxing commentator Mike Angove (left) is one of the great things on Sky. But the cost of watching sports has become a low blow for too many people. Photo / Andrew Cornaga Photosport

Not everyone deserves a happy New Year.

Sky TV doesn't, not for now. Forget the Lions rugby tour. The big battle of 2017 will be, or should be, how you watch sport and what you pay for it.

We are badly served by an outdated monopoly in this country and sport is being hurt in the process.

Over the past month, having added the Rugby Channel (briefly, to watch the Australia-England game) and paid for the $60 Joseph Parker-Andy Ruiz WBO title fight, I've handed Sky TV around $200. TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS. Not only does that stink, but it is an expense beyond many which means the masses are being cut off from something they love.

And I've watched very little content for that money, and certainly far less than on Netflix, which charges $15 a month.

I won't pretend the changes needed are easy, but the time is upon us troops. I know a lot of people who have quit Sky and in my own case, I am watching less and less. And much of the sport I do watch is presented in a drab and patronising way (although a huge thumbs up here to boxing commentator Mike Angove, who has been absolutely superb ringside in the Joseph Parker era).

One of the downers of 2016 was Sky's tired, lazy dishevelled coverage of the Olympics. It was as if the Sky mob had got out the pipe and slippers, while they piped in whatever happened turn up from Rio.

And to think, they've now got hold of the America's Cup. There are already rumours that Sky won't be sending any of its own people to cover the yachting in Bermuda, which wouldn't surprise.

Things are changing fast in the sports viewing world but not with Sky. This once terrific One-Stop-Shop is now a One-Stop-Flop. And while the break up or reinvention of this broadcasting Kremlin won't be easy or pretty, it's got to happen somehow.

A recent Daily Mail story reported that viewing numbers for the English Premier League had dropped by an whopping 19 per cent. Two broadcasters paid a combined total of around $9billion for the new domestic rights (the EPL will scoop a similar amount for the growing overseas market) but the home fans are dropping away. Free-to-air numbers weren't all that flash either. Punters are flocking the other way, or make that to another way.

A major reason for the decline was given as a growing preference for online and mobile content, with a researcher telling the paper there was "an acceleration towards digital video content - people have cut the cord on TV"

In other words, the default item in many sports fans' hands these days is not a remote control, it's a telephone. People don't watch entire games anymore. They flit around, from game to game, sport to sport, package to package, highlight to highlight, news item to news item.

Digital will change many things. Indeed, if viewers are no longer glued to watching entire games on large screens, those intrusive on-field signs, hoardings and TV advertisements are going to be worth far less.

Sports/broadcasters who have to live in the real world design innovative and reasonably priced packages, and deliver them with enthusiasm.

American basketball is a prime example. The NBA packages include things like a $14-a-month "Game Choice" which gives subscribers eight games plus standard add-ons such as on-demand replays. The NFL meanwhile has its groundbreaking Red Zone, a real time and fast-paced highlights concept from around the grounds.

Compare that to Sky's drab $55-a-month fan pass, a computer/mobile streaming service including the four main sports channels which may sound okay, but means subscribers are at the mercy of Sky's whims as to what they can watch. (for example, Fan Pass has excluded big tournaments such as football's Euro 2016 and NBA playoffs).

It may represent a move in the right direction, but I don't know anybody who uses Fan Pass regularly. Maybe it needs greater promotion, more vital content...and a price reduction.

Here's the rub for rugby: the Sky approach will have an increasingly negative effect on the game if it doesn't move with the times. Beneath the booming All Blacks, rugby has lost its soul and connection with the people in recent years, and the full effects of this have still to be felt. This has a lot to do with Super Rugby, an awful piece of corporate fakery with an unintelligible points table. But stick this nonsense behind a sky-high paywall and you have a major problem waiting to happen.

New Zealand First MP Clayton Mitchell is promoting a bill to get key sport covered free-to-air and backing Mitchell is probably one way of fighting for change. But traditional, free-to-air coverage on TV isn't the total answer.

Sport does need to be paid for, somehow. Reasonable prices, a range of plans, and innovative ways of watching are where this game is going.