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Premiership's £500m debt: How much each club actually owes
By Ian Cameron
How much debt is owed by each Gallagher Premiership club has been revealed as part of their participation in a UK government committee next month.
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English rugby bosses are being asked to explain themselves in a parliamentary committee next month to address the game’s financial crisis.
Officials from the Rugby Football Union (RFU) and Premiership Rugby will appear before the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) committee in November to answer questions on the problems facing those clubs and the wider sustainability of the game.
As a result of that committee, the figures owed by each club has been published on the House of Commons website, with the total amount including the now defunct Worcester Warriors totalling over half a billion pounds.
This mountain of debt includes that of Wasps, who owe a staggering £112.3 million, by far the largest single debt in the league, amounting to 24 per cent of the total.
Wasps joined Worcester in administration on Monday, making 167 members of staff including players and coaches redundant. Both clubs had already been suspended from the Gallagher Premiership, which now contains just 11 teams.
The loss of both Wasps and Worcester from the league for this season has meant that sides also have sizeable holes in their fixture calendar. Empty stadiums will mean a further loss of revenue for clubs, many of whom are now seeking to make ad hoc fixtures to make up the difference.
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Following Wasps, the second most indebted club is Bristol Bears, who owe £51.2 million, which is 11 per cent of all the debt in the league.
Third on the list is Saracens, who owe £40.8 million, 9 per cent of the total debt of the league.
Bath have debts totalling £37.8 million, which equates to 8 per cent of the league’s total. London Irish aren’t far behind with £37.3 million.
Fellow Londoners Harlequins also have a significant amount of debt, with £33.7 million. Newcastle Falcons, who are typically viewed as one of the smaller operations in the league, owe £32 million. Both the Tynesiders and Quins individual debut equates to roughly 7 per cent of the league.
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Big spending Sale Sharks have £30.9 of debt, which is again approximately 7 per cent of the competition’s total debt.
Midland heavyweights Leicester Tigers owe £30.1 million.
Gloucester owe £27.1 million, while Northampton Saints follow closely on £26.5 million.
By far the least amount of debt is owed by Exeter Chiefs, at £13 million, which is equal to just 3 per cent of club debt.
Worcester Warriors debt is not included in the list, with the other e12 clubs’ total equalling £473.7 million. When you add Worcester’s debt, which is at least £30 million when you tally what they owe HMRC and other creditors, then the combined total is over half a billion.
The PRL are likely to be taken to task on the lack of regulation of individual club finances. As the body is basically a confederation of clubs, it’s a case of self-policing, as the RFU have little say unless a club enters insolvency.
Surely all businesses have to pay employees based upon the value that employee generates. If players are not driving multi-million pound profits they shouldn't be earning the silly salaries? In my mind the clubs are themselves completely to blame for trying to keep up with the Jones's
One of the biggest issues was the last TV contract was negotiated so badly when it was expected to be a big jump post home world cup. It actually in real terms went down compared to the previous deal. Wasps got screwed/screwed themselves trying to diversify and create multiple revenue streams via hotel,casino, netball team and events in stadium and conference center. Whilst spending big of out of cap players to try and bring in more fans/media/sponsors. Overinvestment in front end compared to significant under investment in back end facilities such as training facility. Struggled to hold onto cheap talent at youth levels compared to leicester, northampton, sarries and hartpury.
If Covid hadnt happened I'm sure wasps would have survived the HMRC debts and would have enough cash to at least partially pay bond holders or be attractive enough for an investor to pay yhe bondholders for a significant of the club. Worcester should never have been sold in 2018 due to the new owners at the time not having the capital to fund the club and its other investments.
This is a bigger rugby issues as everytime the RFU or prem rugby has investment/brings in people from the outside to modernise the finances etc they always seem to get booted out or very slow to move as a group. This apart from france and NZ domestic rugby has had no growth for a very long time worldwide
What's crazy is that just one of the many mega billionaires who've bought football clubs over the last 20 or so year could wipe this away immediately.
I've seen recent net worth estimates for Premiership club owners and frankly it was pretty shocking. They're all rich, but almost all of them are normal rich. Wealth in the millions, tens of millions at most. The amount of wealth you could win in a single lottery. Almost makes a Premiership club seem attainable.
Poor compared to football owners. On the flip side while more wealth in the domestic game is a necessity, I wouldn't want rugby to become football. Only a matter of time before the American owners get their way and create an NFL style league across Europe, I'd never want that sort of culture to come into this game. But we do need more wealth.
An overhaul of the system is long overdue with much more transparency on financial matters