RACING
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SOUTHERN District racing officials remain hopeful that the dispute between broadcasters TVN and Sky Racing will have a minimal impact on the region's punters.
A blackout of NSW and Victorian thoroughbred racing on Sky Racing began on Thursday due to unsuccessful negotiations between the pair.
TVN holds the television rights to racing in Victoria and NSW and had committed to short-term rollover deals with Sky to allow it to show vision for the past two years until talks broke down and TVN walked away from their rival's latest offer on Wednesday.
The blackout could leave Saturday's Albury Racing Club's TAB meeting in the dark given TVN's commitment to offer premium coverage of Sydney and Melbourne metropolitan meetings on its Foxtel channel 522.
With seven NSW and Victorian TAB meetings scheduled for tomorrow, TVN will struggle to show each race, as well as provide its usual mounting yard coverage and interviews of metropolitan racing.
Albury's meeting will go ahead, but what coverage it gets remains to be seen.
TVN had not finalised its broadcast plans for Saturday as of Thursday afternoon but Albury Racing Club chief executive John Miller expects minimal impact to punters.
"I contacted Racing NSW (Thursday) morning and I was told the vision would be on TVN," Miller said.
"I'm a bit like everyone else though, we're going to be down the bottom of the food chain and if anyone is going to be cut and miss out, it's going to be us or somewhere like Moree or Wangaratta."
For punters, the blackout will not be as dramatic as a decade ago.
Pubs and clubs have been allowed access to TVN for no cost, in the short term, while TVN is also part of the basic Foxtel package.
For Albury, and Murrumbidgee Turf Club with its Ted Ryder Cup meeting on Tuesday, less coverage and vision of the meetings could hit each club's bottom line.
Race clubs get a set percentage of TAB betting turnover on their respective meetings.
While the percentage is only small for Saturday meetings, it is at least six times greater for midweek meetings like at Wagga on Tuesday.
MTC chief executive Scott Sanbrook hopes the two parties can sort the issue out as soon as possible.
"If the broadcasting issue is not resolved by Tuesday, I expect it to have an effect on TAB turnover," Sanbrook said.
"A club's major revenue stream is distribution from their turnover and if turnover is down it will have an influence on the club's bottom line."
As long as TVN show Albury's meeting on Saturday, Miller cannot see any problem for his race day.
"The way the scheme is set up, with Saturday meetings turnover is not as crucial," he said.
"If you're relying on a Saturday meeting only for turnover then you're in the wrong game.
"You run Saturday meetings to get people through the gate."
Queensland, South Australia and Western Australia's racing will continue to be shown on Sky, as will all TAB harness racing and greyhound meets.