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The Premiership Rugby response to latest league merger speculation
By PA
Premiership Rugby appear to have killed off proposals for a British and Irish or Anglo-Welsh league in favour of retaining a 10-team domestic competition. Chief executive Simon Massie-Taylor has insisted that the Gallagher Premiership is in a “very strong position” after the possibility of a merger with sides from Ireland, Scotland and Wales was discussed at board meeting of English clubs last month.
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In setting up such a competition in order to grow revenue from broadcast and commercial deals, the United Rugby Championship would be dissolved with its South African and Italian teams marooned without a league.
An Anglo-Welsh structure – a long-term talking point – has also been examined as a way of increasing value, in the process helping the ailing regions with more appealing cross-border fixtures. But Massie-Taylor has indicated that the Premiership will remain intact in its current format, stating that the “benchmark is massively high” when considering changes.
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“You need to think not just four years ahead, but 10 years ahead,” he said. “You ask all the questions around European competitions and you’ve got to keep a long-term open mind about how things will pan out. We are really proud of the Premiership. We think it’s on a really good trajectory and the numbers prove that with the interest around it.
“If you were ever to change things, the benchmark is massively high and it should be. You look at all sorts of options but the obvious thing to say about a British and Irish league is what happens to the rest of URC? Because they’ve shareholders there and they’d all need to agree to do something different.
Gallagher Premiership
P
W
L
D
PF
PA
PD
BP T
BP-7
BP
Total
1
Saracens
3
3
0
0
15
2
Bristol
3
2
1
0
12
3
Leicester
3
2
1
0
10
4
Bath
3
2
1
0
10
5
Northampton
3
2
1
0
9
6
Sale
3
2
1
0
9
7
Harlequins
3
1
2
0
8
8
Gloucester
3
1
2
0
8
9
Exeter Chiefs
3
0
3
0
2
10
Newcastle
3
0
3
0
0
“When you look at the relative economics of things it’s quite hard to make it work for all stakeholders. I do think we’re in a very strong position. It’s difficult to see how you take an expansive approach without compromising elsewhere in the system.”
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Premiership Rugby’s director of rugby Phil Winstanley also ruled out the possibility of Welsh teams joining the second-tier Championship with the aim of securing promotion, while stressing that the addition of the regions would force a fixture overlap with the Six Nations.
“We are in a really strong position in the Premiership so even to have the conversation the bar has to be so high,” he explained. Private equity giants CVC acquired a 27 per cent share in Premiership Rugby in 2018 and a 28 per cent share of PRO14 Rugby in 2020.
It was hoped that their involvement as well as the injection of cash would propel the club game to a new level, but instead it helped the game weather the financial turbulence caused by the pandemic. “CVC has a share hold in both. It’s not a vote on either/or when it comes to decisions like this,” Massie-Taylor said.
“As is their style, they have been very collaborative and encouraging of long-term thinking. This isn’t a mandate from them to come up with a solution. They realise the complexity. The Anglo-Welsh they would care about because they’ve got an investment in URC.”
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I find this whole idea mildly amusing. The only URC teams who might be interested in this idea are in Wales. He probably didn’t mean it like this, but it almost sounds as if we’re to believe that the Premiership is rejecting the approaches of eager URC teams. I just can’t believe that.
An expected outcome of course, the change required would be momentous and needs to happen over time. A knee-jerk reaction by some teams in the URC and Premiership Rugby would have been form their own comp would have been calamitous to Rugby.
That a British & Irish (possibly) league is the best fit for a sport like Rugby in that area is unchallengeable.
That South Africa need something that offers better player welfare is unchallengeable.
That the game is going to grow in the rest of Europe and Africa is inevitable, as is that those nations are going to need a competition to call their own.
I see all three of these aligning in the perfect world.
I enjoy the URC. It's going from strength to strength every season. 3 different winners from 3 different countries in 3 seasons, 4 if the truncated Rainbow Cup gets included where Benetton beat the Bulls in the final. All the ratings would drop if SA teams gets dropped. The Currie Cup is dead. It was dead the moment Super Rugby started. There is contracts, so it won't be as easy as people think to drop SA and Italy from the URC. It won't be financially viable to the URC and it's sponsors like CVC. I might be wrong, but the URC is already seen as the best competition except for the Top 14 and the Champions Cup.
How would you enjoy it if say all the Japanese stars were instead playing in Dubai?
What if some of the great talent that isn't getting a lot of URC minutes at the minute was playing for Lagos City
I have to be honest and say I don't think the URC is working at the minute, none of the games seem to have any interest with the local population. Wouldn't South Africa be more interesting in an African competition? Seeing themselves going up against other/more South African's along with the best African talent? That's what I'd say is the biggest desire for SRP's future at the moment.
As the article and PR say (and you're own comment eludes to), the whole idea of change is not something that can be achieved in the now. A change to British rugby would need to be done in partnership with African and European, so if the game is to global progress it's only going to be along these lines imo. If it's seen as too good currently to change, it really is never going to change and get better. I think a real prospect like I describe could be acheived within a decade.
I wish that this would happen. Let the insolvent English clubs merge with the dirt poor Welsh regions so that they can be thumped weekly by Irish and Scottish provincial teams.
Finally SARU will be forced to reinvest into a 10 or 12 team Currie Cup and its happy days again when there were 60 000 people showing up for tribal rivalries. Alas this may only happen after 2030 when the planets align for CVC.
Yeah you'd hope that a proper league format would be one of the key transitional changes of such a competition, and as such the Irish and Scott's might not be as powerful too actually, but really it would see the Welsh only having a couple of teams in the top division and hence organically maybe only 1, 2, or 3 centers of rugby would be at a level able to play top club footy. The rest can fight for promotion but ultimately you'd see him as being a Championship level semi pro team.