Rarely has the gap between how rugby would like to be perceived and the unvarnished reality felt wider than it did on a grey midweek lunchtime in the City of London. The Honourable Artillery Company – “Turn right just past the cannon, sir” – remains a seriously valuable piece of real estate which made it an interesting choice of venue from which to launch a coruscating critique of the financial state of English club rugby.
It was certainly instructive to sit among seated rows of money men and lawyers listening to assorted experts, academics and – boom, tish! – the former England flanker James Haskell assessing the findings of a newly published independent report into the health of the Premiership’s finances. Interrupted only by the occasional chiming of a splendid grandfather clock, it was the most contemporary of debates in the most old school of settings.
The crux of it was simple: rugby urgently needs to get its head out of the sand. The report, commissioned by the respected UK corporate recovery firm Leonard Curtis, declared seven of the 10 English Premiership clubs to be balance sheet insolvent and warned that further trouble awaits if attempts are not made to do something radically different.
If the individual figures themselves are not especially new – they are drawn from the last public set of club accounts from the 2022-23 season – the aggregated conclusions were impossible to ignore. Total combined debts of £311m and the patronage of a few individual – mostly elderly – backers is not the soundest of foundations from which to build a flourishing professional sport.
The report’s co-authors – Jonathan Dyson, Professor Rob Wilson and Dr Dan Lumley – have received guidance and insight from, among others, the former Harlequins chief executive Mark Evans and the ex-Bath and Scotland winger Simon Danielli, who now works in private equity. Alex Cadwallader, once of England Under-21s, Bristol, Newport, Newcastle and London Welsh and now a specialist restructuring adviser, has also been driving the project which, tellingly, has not been backed by either the Rugby Football Union or Premiership Rugby.
And there, sitting up on the top table determined to tell it absolutely like it is, was the aforementioned Haskell who, in fairness, knows something about this particular subject. At one point he even told a story about going in to see a leading Wasps official when the then Coventry‑based club was heading down the tubes and threatening to smash up his office if he and his teammates were not paid. “If I was a rugby player I’d be terrified by this report,” he told the Guardian, clearly talking from experience. “I think this is now a line in the sand moment where all the spin and bravado around how rugby is faring needs to stop.”
Haskell is not always everyone’s cup of Earl Grey but in this instance he has a point. One audience member made clear that, if certain clubs were normal everyday businesses, they would instantly be declared lost causes. All of them declared a net loss in 2022‑23, with nine of the 10 losing more than £1m and Saracens topping the table with a £5.3m shortfall.
As Cadwallader was keen to stress, every business must eventually live within its means. While the clubs have signed the new Professional Game Partnership with the RFU – worth a guaranteed £3.3m per club per year for the next four years – wages and costs are still too high and the salary cap has gone back up to £6.4m. Six of the clubs had a higher volume of debt at the end of 2022-23 compared with a year earlier, not all of which can be blamed on Covid. The report suggested Sale’s wage bill took up 92% of their revenue; the corresponding figure for Newcastle Falcons was 82%.
Thankfully there were a few glimmers of hope. Harlequins emerged top of the tree based on an index combining results and financial returns since 2018-19, with Northampton and Leicester also on the podium. Playing standards in the league continue to improve and digital engagement is steadily increasing.
There are, however, wider issues at play. A lack of mass‑market visibility outside the Six Nations Championship and the World Cup is clearly not helping the game’s wider profile. Recent research suggests the typical profile of a Test attendee at Twickenham – sorry, Allianz Stadium – is a 55-year-old white male who works in financial services. No wonder the game’s bosses are twitchy about the future.
Haskell, however, thinks it is time for everyone in authority to be braver, whether it be making the game less confusing to new fans, reducing the number of bodies on the field or biting the bullet and moving to a franchise club league. “I don’t think people are thinking clearly. The RFU do a lot of good but they’re an organisation trying to be all things to all men,” he says.
“Unfortunately those days are gone. World Rugby as well. They’re a very slow, creaking organisation in my mind. Is it fear, bureaucracy or incompetence that is holding things back? We are sitting and watching this thing disintegrate. I think someone needs to stand up and make a decision.”
One thing is for certain: rugby’s grandfather clock is starting to tick louder than ever.
