Seven Sport
Seven Sport is the brand and production department under which all sporting events on the Australian Seven Network are broadcast. It broadcasts some of Australia's most prominent sporting events, such as the AFL and cricket, as well as horse racing and motor racing.
Seven Sport previously broadcast tennis and the Olympics & Paralympics for the best part of half a century, exclusively since the early 1970s and Moscow 1980 respectively. Seven lost the broadcast rights to both to arch-rival the Nine Network in 2018 and 2022 respectively. It caused the biggest ever 'shake-up' of Australian television sports broadcasting with widespread media coverage and public discussion at the time.
History
Australian rules football
From the first year of television in Australia in 1956 to 2001, Seven was the main broadcaster of the VFL/AFL. From 1974 to 1986 Seven was along with the ABC the main broadcaster of the VFL showing replays and highlights of matches played that Saturday. In 1977 Seven paid the VFL $500,000 to broadcast the Grand Final and a further $500,000 to broadcast the Grand Final Replay also live with the drawn match watch by 1.2 Million viewers at the time the biggest daytime audience in Australia television history. In 1987, after taken over by new ownership from Sydney, HSV-7 lost the VFL rights to Broadcom who on sold the rights in Victoria to the ABC after offering less money compared to the previous year, the rights were regained the next year.In 2001 the Seven Network announced that after 45 years as the official broadcaster of the VFL/AFL that it would finished its partnership at the end of the season. Nine and Ten entered a joint rights deal with pay TV provider Foxtel to ensure that all eight matches of each round were televised, starting in 2002 and concluding in 2006. At the time and being the only broadcaster, Seven broadcast only one match at a timeslot at a time and showed highlights of other matches that were not broadcast.
On 5 January 2006, Seven regained the rights to the AFL in the following broadcast deal, covering the period between 2007 and 2011 inclusive, in a joint contract with Ten and Foxtel. The cost of the deal was A$780 million, an A$280 million increase on the Nine/Ten/Foxtel 2002-2006 joint broadcast venture. Under the deal, Seven and Ten alternated the Brownlow Medal ceremonies and the AFL Grand Final; Seven televised the Friday night and Sunday afternoon Premiership season matches, while Ten televised the two Saturday matches and Foxtel televising the rest. Both Seven and Ten alternate in show the NAB Cup Grand Final, the Brownlow Medal count and the AFL Grand Final.
In 2011, it was announced that Seven and Foxtel would share the football broadcast rights from 2012 to 2016, bringing Ten's 10-year run to an end. Under the new deal, Seven would televise four games per week, and Foxtel would simulcast coverage of Seven's games and broadcast the other five weekly games live and exclusive. Seven televised the entire finals series, with Foxtel simulcasting all finals except for the Grand Final, which was televised live and exclusively by Seven. The deal required Seven to televise all but the Saturday afternoon match live into Victoria and Tasmania; all four games were shown live into the northern states on 7mate and games were shown live or on delay into Western Australia and South Australia depending on Seven's television schedule.
In 2015, Seven commenced broadcasting the WAFL and VFL showing one match a week and all finals from both competitions that did not clash with AFL games in each market, this followed the previous year where SANFL were being broadcast on under the same agreement. For both the WAFL and SANFL, it was the first time since 1987 that each league were broadcast on Seven with all three being on Seven after long association with the ABC ending the previous year.
Also announced in 2015 that Seven would again be the sole free-to-air broadcaster of AFL matches, for the period between 2017 and 2022. Under the deal, Seven no longer televises the Saturday afternoon match into Victoria, however, matches in this timeslot involving interstate teams continue to be televised into their respective markets. Controversially, however, up to three matches involving each of all four of the Western Australia and South Australia clubs are televised on a significant delay, with the telecast starting after the final siren has gone in real time.
Under a revised deal agreement, Channel Seven will show up to five matches per week live on their networks, with Fox Sports broadcasting each and every game on either a Fox Footy or Fox Sports 503. Two matches of both the Eagles and Dockers in WA and one match of both the Crows and Power in SA was shown on a significant delay in the shortened 2020 season. On June 11 the AFL and the Seven Network extended its current agreement until 2022 for an extra two until the end of 2024 with the deal virtually the same as the original one signed prior to 2017.
File:Luke Hodge Kane Cornes Bruce McAvaney.jpg|170px|thumb|Seven Sport's Luke Hodge, Kane Cornes and Bruce McAvaney during the 2025 AFL season
In 2022, Seven was again announced as the sole free-to-air broadcaster of AFL matches, for the period between 2025 and 2031. Under the deal, Seven will broadcast Thursday Night Football for the first 15 rounds of each season. However, they will not broadcast any Saturday Night matches until the final right rounds of the home-and-away season into Victoria.
This changed however, ahead of the 2025 season started, when it was announced that there would be Thursday night matches in all bar two rounds of the season with Seven to broadcast selected Sunday Night games throughout the season instead of Saturday Nights.
This meant that there weren’t any Saturday matches were broadcast into Victoria, Tasmania or the Northern Territory, these arrangements differ outside of those states, where every local team's match will be broadcast on free-to-air, though matches that fell on a Saturday in the first third of the season involving the Western Australia and South Australia clubs along with the New South Wales and Queensland clubs unlike previously, will be on a delay in their local market, similar to the previous deal but on a two-hour delay instead of three, after this stage matches will be shown live. Seven will continue to broadcast weekly Friday Night and Sunday Afternoon matches and for the first were able to live stream matches on their 7plus streaming platform.
In total, Seven produces an average of 3.5 matches a round in the AFL and AFLW seasons and 81 matches in the AFL home-and-away season overall, all AFL and AFLW finals and have exclusive rights to the AFL and AFLW grand finals and the Brownlow Medal count.
Olympics
The network's coverage of the 2000 Sydney Olympics attracted a TV audience of over 6.5 million Australians for the opening and closing ceremonies. The broadcast also ran on the short-lived C7 Sport subscription channel.During its time as the broadcaster of the Olympic Games, it has won the Olympic Golden Rings for the Best Television coverage for the best television programme during the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens.
During the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Seven and NBC Universal were the major recipients of the Golden Rings; with Seven taking the Golden Rings for the best Olympic Programme, the Silver Rings for the best Olympic feature, and the Bronze Rings for the Best Sports Coverage.
During Seven's coverage of the XXIX Olympiad, numerous complaints by the general Australian public were made to the Seven Network for several reasons, including the lack of a broadcast of events to which Australia is not competing in, too many advertisements and at inappropriate times during events and poor commentating of events. There has also been media speculation about the editing of Olympic events by Seven; how live sound from events is faded and the commentary sound is the prominent sound feature.
Seven had exclusive Australian free-to-air, pay television, online and mobile telephony broadcast rights to the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing. The live telecast of the XXIX Olympiad was shared by both the Seven Network and SBS Television. Seven broadcast the opening and closing ceremonies and mainstream sports including swimming, athletics, rowing, cycling and gymnastics. In stark contrast, SBS TV provided complementary coverage focused on long-form events such as soccer, road cycling, volleyball, and table tennis.
Seven's coverage of the 2008 Summer Olympics was widely criticised by viewers, with many angry at the networks contractual obligation to show AFL football over the Olympics. Viewers also complained that many team sports were delayed, with the absence of Roy and HG and with seemingly large amounts of advertising breaks during live events upsetting some viewers. Despite this, the International Olympic Committee awarded Seven the 'Golden Rings' award for "Best Olympic Programme". The award is given for the best overall Olympic coverage.
From 2016, Seven once again became the home of the Summer Olympic Games, Winter Olympic Games and the Summer Paralympic Games until 2022. In October 2020, the Seven Network announced it would be the home of the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing.
Commonwealth Games
Seven screened the 2002 Commonwealth Games from Manchester and were the official broadcaster of the 2018 Commonwealth Games on home soil on the Gold Coast in April 2018. In July 2022, Seven also broadcast the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham.In 2025, the Seven Network has announced it has signed an exclusive agreement with Commonwealth Sport to become the official Australian broadcast media partner for the 2026 Commonwealth Games, which will take place in Glasgow, Scotland, from 23 July to 2 August, and the 2030 Commonwealth Games, for which the host selection process conducted by Commonwealth Sport is currently in progress.