Kerre Woodham: Sky's the limit for my nana

Sky is discussing simultaneous free-to-air broadcasts of just 16 of the 48 matches. Photo / Brett Phibbs

My nana is 99 and she's still as keen on her rugby as she was when she was a slip of a girl. She never misses a Waikato or Chiefs game and if the All Black selectors had listened to Nana Cherry in 2007 - well, let's just say the Rugby World Cup wouldn't have had the South African team inscribed on it.

So when rugby went from free-to-air to Sky, my nana was spitting sparks. And she wasn't alone. Plenty of others thought the same way.

As far as she was concerned, the right to watch rugby was her birthright as a New Zealander.

Hadn't she washed enough rugby jerseys in her time as a wife and mother to pay her dues? Hadn't she helped out, week in, week out at the Kereone club rooms in Morrinsville, and not murmured a word of complaint when my grandad disappeared for weeks on end to play Ranfurly Shield matches in the South Island?

She would NOT pay to watch rugby and that was that. We told her she was cutting off her nose to spite her face and that we'd all pay for the Sky connection and that way, technically, she wasn't compromising her principles, but she wasn't having a bar of it.

The most she will do is watch the rugby at other people's places who've got Sky, and that's been a recent concession.

So I can only imagine her reaction when she hears Sky has won the rights to the 2011 World Cup. But all is not lost. Rugby World Cup Limited is putting up the free-to-air rights for tender and 16 games will be broadcast live, including the knockout games.

We don't yet know who will be the free-to-air broadcaster. TVNZ is in the middle of recessionary cost-cutting and TV3 is probably still counting the cost after winning the rights to the last World Cup - and what a poisoned chalice that turned out to be.

Maori TV will have a long, hard look at bidding but the honest money would have to be with Prime, given its association with Sky. The Sky team will do a great job - their technical crews are the best in the world and they have an understanding of rugby that was lost in translation when the French teams were in charge. So it's win-win for the New Zealand public.

* www.kerrewoodham.com