The sports reporter has spilled on the pick-up method that she hadn’t seen before. Read...

Clayton Lewis will be sentenced in a Sydney court on Wednesday for his role in spot-fixing in the A-League. Read...

A group representing businesses near Auckland`s Eden Park say concerts are significantly more profitable than sporting events. Read...

A round-up of news from around the region, including French Polynesia hosting the 2031 Pacific Islands Forum leaders` meeting. Read...

The alleged incident is understood to have occurred at The Boundary, a cricket-themed Chelsea pub co-owned by several current and former sports figures. Read...

Test your sporting knowledge with our weekly quiz on current sports events. Read...

Manchester United are investigating how players` boots ended up getting lost before their crucial Women`s Champions League qualifier in Norway on Thursday. Read...

The last time HBO Max subscribers got hit with a price hike, the service was still called “Max.” But following the recent switch back to HBO Max, the streamer’s boss sounds like he’s itching for a price increase.  “The fact that this is quality—and that’s true across our company, motion picture, TV production and streaming quality—we all think that gives us a chance to raise [the] price,” said Warner Bros. Discover CEO David Zaslav during a recent investor conference (as per The Hollywood Reporter). “We think we’re way underpriced. We’re going to take our time.”  When Zaslav says “we’re going to take our time,” I’d interpret that as maybe a month or two, not much more. The last time HBO Max (we’ll just keep calling it that to cut down on confusion) raised prices was roughly 15 months ago, when the streamer hiked the price of its two ad-free tiers by a buck each, while leaving its “Basic with Ads” tier alone.  Here’s a breakdown of HBO Max’s current price structure:  Basic with Ads: $9.99 a month, or $99.99 a year  Standard: $16.99 a month, $169.99 a year  Premium: $20.99 a month, $209.99 a year  As a reminder, HBO Max’s Premium tier gives you four simultaneous 4K UHD streams with Dolby Atmos support plus up to 100 downloads at a time. The Standard plan offers two 1080p streams with 30 downloads at once, while Basic with Ads serves up two ad-supported 1080p streams without the downloads.  While HBO Max’s Basic with Ads tier didn’t get hit with a price hike last June, it did lose access to the Bleacher Report as well as CNN back in February, leaving subscribers with less to stream in terms of live sports and news coverage.  So, when might a new HBO Max price hike arrive? Zaslav didn’t specify during his remarks earlier this week, but streaming price increases tend to land around the same time as quarterly earnings are announced. HBO Max parent Warner Bros. Discovery delivered its second-quarter 2025 earnings in early August, which means we’re due for another quarterly earnings report in November. Look for word of price increases right around then, if not sooner. The good news is that HBO Max does offer annual plans, which allow you to lock in a cheaper rate before a planned price hike kicks in, provided you’re willing to fork over for an entire year’s worth of streaming at once.  Aside from his pricing remarks, Zaslav touched on HBO Max’s password sharing crackdown, which is slated to crank up several notches in the coming months. HBO Max rolled out an “Extra Member Add-On” option back in April that lets subscribers share their accounts with others outside their households for $7.99 a month per sub-account.  While HBO Max has been content with “gentle messaging” towards users that are suspected of sharing passwords, the streamer has promised to get more “aggressive” as the year rolls on.  “We haven’t been pushing on the password sharing and the economics yet,” Zaslav said. “People are really starting to love HBO Max. That’s the key. We want them to fall in love with our content, with our series…It’s all tricky with the password sharing. We’re going to begin to push on that.” Read...

You don’t need a full-priced pay TV package to get local channels and sports anymore. While YouTube TV and Hulu + Live TV cost upwards of $83 per month, new skinny bundles from DirecTV, Fubo, Sling TV, and even Comcast offer live sports for less. New standalone options from ESPN and Fox present even more ways to save money. But depending on what you want to watch, some of these bundles will work better than others. The situation reminds me a bit of cord-cutting’s early years, in which every live TV streaming service came with some notable omissions. Below, I’ll help you sort through them all to find the best sports bundle for your needs. Streaming sports packages compared Here’s a chart with all of the sports bundles available as of September 2025: Jared Newman / Foundry You can also view a Google Sheets version of this chart. I took some liberties with which services to include in the chart, most notably omitting full-size pay TV packages such as YouTube TV ($83 per month), Hulu + Live TV (also $83 per month), Fubo’s standard packages (starting at $98 per month after regional sports fees), and DirecTV’s Signature packages (starting at $85 per month). Those packages include a broader mix of entertainment channels, so one of them would be a better choice if you’re trying to fully replicate a cable bundle. For the services I did include, it’s helpful to think of them in terms of what each one is missing. For instance: DirecTV MyNews: Offers local channels, but no other sports channels. DirecTV MySports: No Tennis channel. Fubo Sports: No NBC or other Comcast-owned channels, and nothing from Warner Bros. Discovery (such as TNT and TBS). Xfinity Sports & News: No league-specific channels. Sling TV Select: Only works for sports if the local channels it carries are available in your particular market. ESPN Unlimited bundles: Missing at least two of the big four local channels and many less-popular sports channels. Note that with DirecTV’s skinny bundles and Sling Select, local channels aren’t available in every market, and Fubo is only selling its Sports bundle in select markets for now. In all cases, you’ll need to check their websites for availability in your area. As for Xfinity’s Sports & News bundle, it’s only available in Comcast’s cable markets, although it doesn’t require a cable box. You can also access it via the Xfinity Stream app on Roku, Fire TV, Apple TV, Samsung TVs, and LG TVs. If you’re wondering why most of these sports-focused bundles also include cable news, that’s a whole other story. Fox has reportedly been unwilling to uncouple Fox News from its broadcast and sports channels, so there’s likely some reluctance by other programmers to unbundle as well. Which is the best sports bundle? The great thing about these new packages is that there is no one-size-fits-all answer as to which one is best. If you’re only trying to watch your local NFL team and can’t pick up the broadcast with one of our favorite antennas, for instance, DirecTV MyNews will be your cheapest option. Conversely, antenna users might use ESPN Unlimited’s bundles to supplement what they can get for free over-the-air. Fubo Sports’ lack of NBC could also be fine if you can do without Sunday Night Football, while DirecTV MySports comes closest to meeting all your sports needs (albeit at a higher price). What each of these services provide is a modicum of choice and flexibility in an industry that’s long been bereft of it. As such, they’ve recalibrated how much you’ll need to spend to watch both your local broadcast channels and live sports. Sign up for Jared’s Cord Cutter Weekly newsletter for more streaming TV advice. Read...

A round-up of sports news from around the region, including Hamiso Tabuai-Fidow being ruled out of playing for Samoa in rugby league`s Pacific Championships. Read...