BY SCOTT DILLON

News Corp CEO Robert Thomson says Foxtel is working with the NRL as the pay TV station seeks “lower fees for a COVID-19 shortened season and sustainable future costs.”

In an article published by Financial Review (owned by Nine Entertainment), Thomson argued there was a “new reset reality”.

“There obviously needs to be a fundamental reset. The idea that things will suddenly return to normal this season is absurd. It’s not just the quantity of gains, but the quality of the experience and that has obviously been diminished,” he said.

“That reset has to apply longer term to rights in Australia, in essence there is a new reset reality.”

But what does that even mean?

Would things be so dire for Foxtel and Nine if they weren’t struggling so much themselves before this point?

Over 11 million people watched four rugby league games alone on Nine last year… sounds like someone really is getting their value

Foxtel is currently in a hole of around $2 billion with News Corp recently injecting $900 million to keep it bubbling.

Just a few years ago Nine was on its knees and saved from death when it sold its assets in a fire sale in 2012.

All this despite the network hitting the campaign trail in recent months yelling at anyone that would listen that it was fed up with the NRL’s “mismanagement” of its own money.

Foxtel is ‘sweating’ on NRL’s return as pay TV service drowns in $2 billion debt

Kettle black.

Nine jumped the gun in April by cutting costs of almost $300 million under the assumption that COVID-19 continued to cause chaos throughout the remainder of 2020. Nine would have saved $130 million if the suspended NRL season didn’t come back.