![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/James-Brayshaw-and-Abbey-Holmes-Friday-Night-Footy-on-Seven.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nJames Brayshaw and Abbey Holmes host Friday Night Footy on Seven<\/p>\n
Following the merger of Seven and SCA, the recently installed management has indicated a focus on cost savings.<\/p>\n
Shortly after Jones was promoted to his current role, replacing Lewis Martin who left unexpectedly in 2024, he set about increasing Seven\u2019s AFL offering to every day of the week, adding the news and analysis show The Agenda Setters to the schedule.<\/p>\n
This year a third edition of the show goes to air on Wednesday nights, plus an NRL version is starting on Mondays.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat seven-day-a-week strategy and all the new shows that we launched are all coming back this year. The most satisfying element of that was it created a 25% incremental reach each week. We did about a million people through our ancillary shows.\u201d<\/p>\n
Jones was adamant those shows need to justify their existence with ad revenue covering production costs and then some.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey need to live and breathe by themselves. There\u2019s no better way of talking about the success of a show than doubling the amount of shows that we did last year compared to this year.\u201d<\/p>\n
He added that those Agenda Setters shows and the other programming linked to the football is not just about helping keep the respective football administrators happy.<\/p>\n
Australia\u2019s \u201cbusiest media CEO\u201d, and a former housemate of Jones\u2019, Craig Hutchison, will host two episodes of The Agenda Setters every week for the time being.<\/p>\n
\u201cGetting these shows up and filling out that AFL ecosystem has been a fantastic play from our perspective. Fiscally it\u2019s been a success as well, which is why we\u2019re doubling down this year on it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sports programmers keep close to ad sales<\/p>\n
In days gone by, the sports department might not have had much to do with sales. Those days are long gone.<\/p>\n
\u201cGary O\u2019Keeffe [Seven\u2019s head of AFL and sport innovation] and myself get heavily involved. We are speaking every single day with key members of the sports sales team \u2013 Rob Maclean, Josh Tanner and Pete Charles. Gary and I will also go out and sit down with some of the clients too.\u201d<\/p>\n
Key clients Jones mentioned included Toyota, McDonald\u2019s, AAMI and Harvey Norman.<\/p>\n
Other Seven clients wanting the footy audience, and helping pay the AFL rights invoice this year, are Coles, Telstra, Sportsbet, Bunnings, Chemist Warehouse, Industry Super Funds, Hostplus, CBUS, NAB, Asahi Beverages, BWS, Colgate-Palmolive and Uber Eats.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, media buyers have also jumped on AFL packages and ancillary program sponsorships for SEEK, OMO Ultimate, Disney, Bupa, Gulf Western Oil, Jim Beam, Betr, Equip Super and view.com.au.<\/p>\n
Former AFL gun Kane back for more in year two of Seven contract<\/p>\n
One of the keys to Seven\u2019s success with additional AFL programming last year was the signing of Kane Cornes. He was poached from Nine at the end of 2024 where he was arguably underused. Understandable perhaps as Nine is not an AFL rights holder.<\/p>\n
He took on a huge workload at Seven, appearing on The Agenda Setters and joining the commentary team in addition to breakfast radio commitments for Craig Hutchison as SEN.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s an absolute workhorse and he\u2019s just had one of the great holidays, giving himself a good break. He was away for something like 50 days with the family.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe look at the workload with all of our people. Every one of our AFL talent is booked in to have a week off because it\u2019s a 30-week season. We definitely want to look after our people.\u201d<\/p>\n
The growing importance of 7plus is one of the things Jones points to when asked about learnings from season 2025.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe saw with the AFL Legends game, which was the first time that we\u2019d had exclusive AFL match content in 2025, and all of a sudden a huge audience flocked to 7plus. Following that up with exclusive coverage of the Brownlow Medal and AFLGrand Final helped keep those 7plus numbers growing. More recently we had record streaming numbers for the AFL State of Origin match last month.\u201d<\/p>\n
Seven will still turn up for every match it broadcasts<\/p>\n
Jones confirmed that cost-cutting won\u2019t impact the broadcaster\u2019s commitment to send broadcasters to every game. It was something Seven highlighted last year with commentator Brian Taylor noting regularly how Foxtel and Kayo didn\u2019t attend every game, choosing to call some from the TV while having only a boundary reporter at the ground.<\/p>\n
Jones: \u201cWe don\u2019t think it\u2019s possible to call the game in the same way if you\u2019re sitting in a studio instead of sitting at the venue, feeling the atmosphere of the crowd, being able to have that full view of the ground and everything that\u2019s happening. So, again this year, like we did on our cricket coverage, we\u2019ll have our commentators at every game.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe other thing that we\u2019ve lent into in a big way is my belief that there should be a journalist working on every sporting event we cover.\u201d<\/p>\n
Seven continues to invest in sports reporters, with Mitch Cleary and Xander Maguire already on the books, and Tom Morris starting soon after he was poached from Nine.<\/p>\n
Coming soon: Triple M AFL with pictures<\/p>\n
When asked about potential cross promotions with new colleagues at SCA, Jones sparks up, labelling it \u201cthe most exciting thing that could possibly have happened to the Seven Sport team as well as our business as a whole\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you think about Triple M listeners, they are your rusted-on 25-54 audience that traditionally have paid for or streamed sports. We\u2019ve obviously got a great partnership with SEN and Rainmaker [who are outsourced to produce some of Seven\u2019s sport programming] as well, and so we\u2019ve got the ability to speak to that core sport viewer and try and educate them on 7plus and bring them into our ecosystem.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd once we do, we\u2019re going to provide a whole lot for them. When you think about the Triple M commentary, it\u2019s a very different commentary to Seven\u2019s. It\u2019s a lot looser and a little more fun and certainly male-skewed.<\/p>\n
\u201cOnce we get things lined up, we could have the Triple M commentary sitting over Seven pictures on 7plus and have our traditional commentary living on Seven. That\u2019s just one of a huge list of ideas.\u201d<\/p>\n
He wasn\u2019t prepared to share any of the others just yet, but he\u2019s working through that with SCA\u2019s head of sports content Ewan Giles.<\/p>\n
Is live sport taking over free-to-air TV?<\/p>\n
Given the guaranteed audiences live sport delivers for advertisers, will it marginalise drama and reality productions?<\/p>\n
Jones\u2019 answer: \u201cNo, but\u2026<\/p>\n
\u201cI work incredibly closely with Angus [Ross, Seven MD television] and Brook [Hall, chief content officer]. They\u2019ve both been wonderful mentors to me. Also Majella [Hay, director of content, unscripted], she is just superb. We\u2019re literally one team. We don\u2019t live in silos. Of course, I\u2019m always prosecuting the best case for sport, but our content doesn\u2019t live in pillars.<\/p>\n
\u201cLive sport at the moment anywhere around the world is going gangbusters. It\u2019s appointment viewing and people don\u2019t want to watch it on delay. They watch it live and they\u2019re a captive audience. I keep talking about the sport ecosystem, and it\u2019s definitely something we\u2019re looking to grow.\u201d<\/p>\n
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