ConsMedia owns 25% of pay-TV group Foxtel and 50% of Premier Media Group (PMG), the producer of Fox Sports. The 2013-17 NRL rights tender is likely to open later this year and recent reports have suggested the League has been advised that it could attract as much as A$1.4 billion (US$1.47 billion) – a huge increase on the current deal with Channel 9 and PMG that is worth around $100 million per year and higher than the $1.25 billion agreement the Australian Football League sealed with Foxtel, Seven and Telstra in April.

“There are question marks about some of the sporting costs,” Alexander told The Australian. “Clearly there has been a lot of publicity about the NRL deal coming up and obviously Fox Sports already takes a large chunk of the NRL. I don't think there is any appetite at Fox Sports to hand vast additional cheques for no extra value.”

Alexander added: “Unless (current NRL broadcaster) Channel 9 has got much, much deeper pockets than we all believe then I think the prices that have been talked about with NRL remain confusing.” ConsMedia’s biggest shareholders are media mogul James Packer, who owns 51%, and Kerry Stokes' Seven Group, which owns 24%.

Patrick Delany, the new chief executive of PMG, has hinted that he would like to acquire the live rights to all games if the “value equation” is right. PMG’ Fox Sports currently shows five out of eight matches per round.