What you need to know:

• Nine confident of strong tennis ratings in the face of "weak counterprogramming" from competitors.
• The network insists audience experience and advertiser integration is not suffering ill-effects of restrictions and player lockdowns.
• Nine's Matt Granger claims brand integration "enhanced" by the use of wider channels such as 9Now, radio and print.
• BVOD platform 9Now registered a "reasonable bump" in spend ahead of the tournament, with Nine expecting “good numbers” and more log-in data to follow.

Lobbing bombs

Nine expects the Australian Open to smash what it describes as anaemic scheduling from other broadcasters, with the delay to the tournament playing into network’s hands.

"The counterprogramming that's been attempted by competitors is looking weak at the moment, giving us an even stronger platform to drive into, which could even bolster some of our earlier evening sessions," said sports sales boss Matt Granger.

Granger's claims allude to Seven's latest tent-pole show Holey Moley, which last week recorded night on night audience declines of 25% and 26% (update: Seven states that selecting a two night comparison is misleading and that to 7 February, the show has notched 57% year on year timeslot growth).

Equally, Nine claims it is unfazed by the recurrent Network 10 summer hit, I'm a Celeb, which typically competes with the first week of the annual tennis tournament.

Focusing on Nine’s own challenges, Director of Sport Brent Williams believes Covid restrictions will not degrade the experience for viewers.

"We've put everything behind this and will still have live crosses and action shots across the park, just relegated to the specific zones set up to meet the current guidelines," said Williams.

"It will still look and feel like the Australian Open and the production team will also work to amplify those 'player stories', such as Serena chasing history with 24 Grand Slam titles."

Net gains?

Alongside production hurdles, Nine is also grappling with advertising and integration challenges.

In recent years, Uber Eats has seamlessly integrated celebrities such as Magda Szubanski, Lee Lin Chin and players such as Nick Kyrgios and Rafael Nadal into ads that look as though they are taking place during the live match broadcast. Restrictions have forced a rethink of those ‘live-look’ campaigns.

"There will be some changes this year but creativity hasn't suffered," said Granger. "You will see brands continue to use clever integration, albeit slightly different from previous years.”

He also thinks brand integration will benefit from BVOD audience growth on 9Now, and tighter alignment across its broader media assets.

"There's a lot more available to advertisers this year than before and that's really helped maintain sponsorship engagement, so expect to see those integration deals appear cross-platform,” said Granger.

Meanwhile, Nine is hoping the tennis drives more sign-ups – highly valued first party data via 9Now. "We are expecting to see good numbers," said Granger.

To date, the network has amassed 13 million signed-in users. It is now using that data via Adobe’s Audience Manager platform to compete with the likes of Facebook and Google on targeted advertising.

Other networks hope to plot a similar course. Seven aims to double user IDs to 11 million by 2022 on the back of the Olympic Games, currently scheduled to take place in Tokyo in July.