It was around 3am on June 17, 2018 when those of us working on the editorial and social media team for Optus Sport got a surprise visit from the telco’s then-CEO Allen Lew.
With the #Floptus storm fully raging we were told to down tools. Every social media post of every match report or feature we wrote was, understandably, being flamed, the Optus name dragged through the sewer on Facebook and Twitter.
Optus, it appeared, had completely and catastrophically underestimated the Australian interest in World Cup games beyond the big nations and the Socceroos, and its systems were completely inadequate. Across the country fans who had signed up and paid for to watch the service were greeted with the spinning wheels of death.
Optus had the sole rights to some games – others were shared with SBS – and serious outages affected matches that morning between Peru and Denmark and Croatia and Nigeria.
Lew promised the next day that the issue would be fixed, but it wasn’t.
Later that night the social team was urging viewers to log into the FIFA World Cup app to view the Costa Rica vs Serbia game while “our tech teams work to fix the problem.”
Talk about being ratioed!
The service was in meltdown and Lew made the call to give up their exclusive games to be shared with SBS, and free subscriptions to Optus for the rest of the tournament and into the next Premier League season.
In those long nights, it seemed unlikely Optus could survive the year as a sports platform.
On Monday, after weeks of speculation, it was announced the Optus was walking away from the game seven years after that debacle and nine years after replacing Fox Sports as the home of the EPL.
In August, the mantle will be picked up by Stan, bringing the Premier League and FA Cup competitions into the same stable as the Champions League.
It was announced the J.League and United States women’s league will also go to Stan, which has left doubt over the future of broadcasts of the English Women’s Super League – home of several big name Matildas players such as Sam Kerr, Mary Fowler, Steph Catley and Caitlin Foord.
Optus recovered well after the World Cup fiasco and was, mostly, a worthy home of the PL, as well as bringing the WSL and women’s World Cup to an eager Aussie fan base.
Bryleeh Henry of Australia celebrates scoring a goal against Chinese Taipei in the first friendly. (Photo by Daniel Pockett/Getty Images)
They produced some excellent original content to sit alongside the white-labelled match coverage, punditry and shows from Premier League Productions, which Stan is likely to lean into as well. Their coverage of Ange Postecoglou at Spurs, and the women’s competition was also exceptional.
Optus, under a model established by their former Sports Editor editor and The Roar contributor David Weiner, also produced strong written content for their app.
Weiner was a hire from Fox Sports, as were many on the video side, including hosts and producers led, at first, by Richard Bayliss. There will be a significant Fox Sports edge to the new Stan coverage – Mark Bosnich and Adam Peacock were recently reunited to host the Champions League offering and would be expected to lead the PL hosting.
While there was little, if anything, to complain about Optus’s content offering it never completely cast off the flaws of the past.
As a near daily consumer of both Optus for football and Stan Sport for rugby, the user experience of the latter is lightyears ahead of Optus.
Using Optus on an app can be an absolute punish – games often shoot forward to live when you’re watching on delay, sometimes it gets stuck in a seemingly endless advertising loop, and there’s no easy entry points or markers to the start of play, or second half resumption.
Stan has this side of the process locked down and football fans frustrated by the Optus tech will get a pleasant surprise.
There are a couple of areas where the change might cause issues for some potential subscribers, including the price point.
Optus phone customers have been able to add Optus Sport for $10 a month. On Stan it will be part of the sport package that is $15 on top of a Stan subscription. The base cost is $12, meaning a minimum $25 a month to watch Arsenal come second again.
And then there are the missing competitions. Optus was home of international World Cup qualifiers and the Nations League, and hopefully Stan is looking to add those, as well as the WSL.
“This marks a step change in Nine’s digital growth strategy,” said Nine chief executive Matt Stanton in a statement.
“The Premier League is the most watched football league on the planet, and alongside the Emirates FA Cup, this acquisition reinforces Nine’s position as the home of sport in Australia.
“We are proud to deliver these iconic competitions to Australian audiences through Stan Sport.
“The full power of Nine will be activated to bring new attention and energy to the Premier League and Emirates FA Cup. With more than 20 million Australians engaging with Nine’s platforms every month, we have an unrivalled ability to generate excitement at scale, drive audience growth and deliver meaningful commercial outcomes for our partners.”
In a statement Optus said:
“We know we have made a significant contribution to growing and developing football fandom in Australia through Optus Sport since it was first launched in 2016, and we are proud of our contribution to the elevation of football broadcasting in this country and globally, highlighted by the FIFA Women’s World Cup 2023 hosted in Australia, which was an historic moment for Optus and women’s sport across the globe.
“We would like to deeply thank our team, customers, fans, followers and partners for supporting us at every step and sharing so many moments together, on and off the pitch.
www.theroar.com.au (Article Sourced Website)
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