The Future of the Premier 15s
The working party looking into the future of the Premier 15s has been thinking big, thinking long.
Gone is the pattern of 3-year cycles used twice since 2017, to be replaced by a 10-year plan. And the sums involved are far larger than anything contemplated before. The RFU’s commitiment could hardly be more wholehearted.
My previous predictions are made to look pretty blinkered. I may have hoped for an end to the pattern of 3-year cycles, but never imagined anything as long-term as a full decade. But the plans must have room for manoeuvre.
Money, money
The financial commitment of the RFU is eye-watering. Let’s start with the projected revenues, set at £174 million. Then the cost of the league – £222 million. These are gigantic sums, and we shouldn’t forget that only a short while ago the pandemic led to life-threatening debts for sporting bodies.
The gap between those two sums is what the RFU calculates would be its investment in the Prem 15s, some £70 million.
Professionalism
The aim is to build a fully professional league within the ten years. That may well prove to be the hardest target to achieve – this refers specifically to the players themselves. It has been one of the curious anomalies of the operation thus far: all the backroom staff are professional; the players are nearly all amateur. How many of them will wish to enter into contracts (of whatever sort) to bring them closer to a professional status?
Rather like the current world of women’s Sevens, there would be no fall-back, no parallel structure below the elite level, for players who don’t make the grade.
The statement phrases its hopes cautiously. It looks to ‘a phased increase in player salaries’. It would represent a huge shift in status for the (currently) 400 players involved.
At present some clubs offer remunerations of varying sizes. They have been the cause of some bitterness in the past, for example from Richmond when they had to walk the plank. They didn’t have the resources available to other clubs; that disparity has underlined the league all through.
The plan is to introduce a cap on these payments, but it’s hard to imagine the currently affluent clubs suffering greatly at the expense of the minnows.
All clubs will have to re-tender, as last time in 2020.
Minimum Operating Standards
These were central to a club’s success in gaining admission in 2017. They are being adjusted, though detail is missing. That may be a cause of worry for one or two clubs where it is not easy to conform to every requirement. The RFU has shown it is not vulnerable to sentiment when coming to life-or-death decisions.
Up and Down
There is a missing topic in the proposals as announced. Sue Day, RFU Chief Operating Officer and Chief Financial Officer, says:
‘We have worked hard to devise a ten-year strategy which will serve to deliver a financially sustainable league, whilst simultaneously accelerating the growth of the women’s game in this country to provide further opportunities for players of all abilities’. [My italics]
The missing topic is any reference to rugby below the Prem 15s. The twelve clubs involved thus far have existed in a sort of vacuum, though some have tie-ups to other local clubs. The attainment gap between them and the lower leagues has grown steadily wider. Under the current proposal it will become completely unbridgeable, unless each of the aspirant clubs suddenly acquires a benevolent billionaire.
In other words, there is no mention here of promotion-relegation, a problem that has bugged the system from the start.
There must be a good fifteen clubs who have had hopes of joining the Prem 15s, for example the Premiership clubs not yet involved, ambitious Championship clubs and Welsh and Scottish clubs (which may or may not already exist.) For example, Leicester Tigers announced that they would be joining Championship North with a view to eventual promotion. They have already established close links with Lichfield, a great women’s club that failed to find acceptance in 2017.
When could they hope to gain admittance? Perhaps the working party has already discussed the matter in some detail, but decided not to include the topic in its opening statement.
Follow the Men?
It is significant that Simon Massie-Taylor, CEO of the (men’s) Gallagher Premiership, was part of the working group. He hopes to see all his remaining members, not already part of the Prem 15s, tied in.
But the Premiership is not the perfect model for the women’s game to follow. In a word, its twelve clubs wallow in debt. As women’s rugby has motored forward in recent years, so its supporters have warned against slavishly following the structures of the men’s game. The Six Nations is a prime example.
When in doubt…
It’s an old gag about English ways: when in doubt, form a committee. Well, the working party has decided on two more layers for the new enterprise: first a company led by a Chief Executive; second, an independent Board of Directors to whom it will report. And both, we can be sure, will be closely watched over by the RFU.
Let’s be optimistic
This is immensely exciting news. The working party has had to square practical realities with dreams of how far elite women’s rugby can develop in England. We can expect much more detail over the coming months. We have another full season to come before any new arrangements come into force.
