As professional rugby is thrown into turmoil once again with Wasps Rugby announcing it is “likely” they will enter into administration “in the coming days”, Bristol Bears director of rugby Pat Lam has called for a league ‘commissioner’ to be appointed.
In another colossal blow for the English domestic game, following Worcester Warriors already being in administration and suspended from the Premiership for the rest of this reason, with relegation to the Championship to follow, Wasps have today cancelled their trip to face Exeter Chiefs on Saturday due to insufficient cash at this time to continue to fund operations until a buyer for the club is found. As a result the former Heineken Champions Cup winners have also been suspended from the Premiership.
Speaking before Wasps’ announcement, but with their troubling predicament at the Coventry-based club well-known, Lam called for Premiership Rugby to sort its act out and appoint a strong commissioner figure to whittle out the self-interest which makes the governance of the top flight game almost impossible.
Premiership Rugby Limited is essentially currently governed by itself, with the 13 clubs who own ‘P shares’ in the league voting on key decisions which has proven particularly troublesome in these turbulent times since the Covid pandemic shutdown professional sport in the UK.
Lam has put his head above the parapet to call for changes to be made for the betterment of the game.
Speaking on Wednesday morning in his midweek press conference ahead of playing Gloucester on Saturday, Lam said: “The solution is Premiership Rugby needs a commissioner.
"The owners choose a commissioner like in American sports and that person has a remit to be able to judge what is the best way going forward for Premiership Rugby.
“He has that remit and he makes those decisions. Every club’s owner chooses who that is [and then hands over power], then we won’t get into the situations we have been.
“In any situation where a unanimous decision is needed, the commissioner comes in because you are never going to get that with 13 people around the table.
In the USA, Major League Baseball has had a commissioner since 1920, the NFL since 1941, the NBA since 1975, with the later two sports, American football and basketball, replacing a president as the previous head of their organisations.
Lam continued: “We have been on both sides of it, does the salary go up or go down? Do we play after the Queen has died on the Friday night or not? Do we change the fixtures draw or not? When you get into these situations where 10 clubs agree and three don’t, or even 12 agree and one doesn’t you get into these stalemate situations.”
Premiership Rugby was heavily criticised for its slow decision to postpone games following the Queen’s death in September, with almost every other professional sporting body making quicker decisions. Bristol were one of the sides caught up in the crossfire with the club’s derby game with Bath Rugby being pushed back 21 hours against their wishes.
As for the salary cap, Bristol and Exeter, are amongst two sides who didn’t want it to remain at £5m, citing their inability to compete with the best teams in Europe in the cup competitions but were out-voted much to their frustration. Although the financial unravelling of several clubs since proves why others were adamant to reduce spending.
Lam continued: “We need a commissioner who stays true to the remit of what the owners want when they appointed them and then every decision is made for what is best for interest of Premiership Rugby.
“I think every owner wants that deep down because on these issues a minority can change everything, including us. We have been in the minority and the majority. “Appointing a commissioner will take this league to a completely different level.
“We need to talk about this moving forward. I might be a bit out of line but my motivation is what is best for the game. I don’t like to see what has happened to our Worcester counterparts, I don’t like to see what is happening to Wasps.”
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