Nine's majority owner Kerry Packer created World Series Cricket in part because he couldn't obtain the rights to Australian test matches at home, even though he offered the Australian Cricket Board a $1.5 million 3-year contract which was rejected by the ACB who signed a 3-year deal with the ABC to broadcast test matches.

Nine's Wide World of Sports was the "first broadcaster to put a microphone on the players for an international cricket match," which later became common practice in the industry.

[6] Billy Birmingham in 1984 released a comedy album that satirized cricket "and in particular Channel Nine's iconic commentary team with Richie Benaud the central figure," which became popular in Australia,[7] called The Wired World of Sports.

David Hill helped establish Nine's Wide World of Sports early on, and was a "sounding board when the billionaire famously sold the network to Alan Bond and then bought it back three years later for less than a quarter of the price."

Writes the Sydney Morning Herald, "Packer's decision to sell Nine to Bond in 1987 for $1.2 billion - before buying back the network in 1990 for $250 million - is legendary in Australian television.

It secured the rights to Australia's cricket tour of the West Indies, Nine's first challenge since winning its World Series war.

Between the late 1970s and 1997, when Australians had wanted to watch continuous sport at home on a summer weekend, they had largely done so by tuning to Nine.

During the early to mid-2000s, Nine for the first time had the FTA rights to the highest competitions of Australia's four biggest spectator sports: rugby league, Australian rules (shared with Ten), cricket and swimming.

The match was hosted by Tony Jones with a guest appearance from Nine's then chief executive and former AFL commentator Eddie McGuire.

[22] Instead, it replaced the coverage with delayed National Basketball League matches in October, with weekly one-hour highlight shows and full games.

After a ten-year hiatus, it was announced that the Wide World of Sports weekly television program would return to Nine on 16 March 2008,[24] using the same theme song as the old version, as well as accessing old footage for replays.

[citation needed] In 2008, the Nine Network and Microsoft joint venture ninemsn had a section dedicated to the Wide World of Sports.

"[31] In 2013, the Wide World of Sports brand was facing challenges from other television networks its broadcast rights to Cricket Australia.

Nine had a contract clause, however, so that if it were to "match the highest offer means it is still expected to retain the rights, despite its exclusive window for negotiations having closed.

"[32] With Nine Network's cricket coverage winning in 1982, the television show won "Most Popular Sports Program" at the Logie Awards in 1986.

In 2017, the WWoS channel was featuring the Netball World Series, hosted by Erin Molan and with commentators Liz Ellis, Sharelle McMahon, Cath Cox and Anne Sargeant.

[40] In 2018, WWoS announced had secured "free TV and streaming rights" for the Masters Tournament to be played at Augusta National Golf Club.

[41] The Wide World of Sports studio was set up in Melbourne for the 2019 Australian Open for tennis, with a commentary team headed up by John McEnroe[42][43] and Jim Courier.

"[44] Macquarie Media in 2020 began airing an hour-long Wide World of Sports radio broadcast hosted by Mark Levy.

[48] In November 2020, Nine Entertainment Co. acquired rights to Rugby Australia, as well as the French Open and The Championships, Wimbledon, with plans for pay-television coverage (ad-free and on-demand) to migrate to a new sport-oriented package on its subscription streaming service Stan, and selected matches/events to be broadcast free on the Nine Network.

The following is a list of past and present personalities featured: Formerly called Sports Sunday until 2024 All times are listed in AEST Various Nine programs including Today, Mornings, Millionaire Hot Seat, The Footy Show, 60 Minutes and Australia's Funniest Home Videos went on hiatus during Nine's broadcast of the 2012 London Olympics.

A daily two-hour highlights package London Gold aired at 9am weekdays following the live overnight coverage.