Jeff Probyn: Let Premiership go it alone and free up RFU cash for all

I can’t help thinking that there is something strange in the way that the Premiership chose to announce their potential new TV deal with BT just a week before a meeting was scheduled to sort out their European problems.
The fact that the headline figure of around £152m is spread over four years with an innuendo that they would be putting around £100m of that total in the European collective pot to benefit all, is slightly misleading – given that that money was for all Premiership rugby, the Aviva, the JP Morgan 7’s as well as whatever European competitions is finally agreed.
If those figures were correct, it would have left just £52m for all non-European Premiership broadcasting or around £1 million per team per year, which would be a substantial reduction in the monies available to those teams that did not qualify for Europe.
If that was the case, I find it difficult to believe it would have received a unanimous vote from everyone in the Premiership.
Now it appears that the Premiership had no right to sell their European rights, one has to wonder whether BT have been used in an elaborate hoax to focus the minds of all the ERC stakeholders to find a solution to the Premiership and Top 14 qualification complaint.
If so, it certainly seems to have worked as there seems to be a willingness by all parties to find a solution as quickly as possible with another meeting scheduled for October now on the agenda.
BT as a new partner would be a great coup for the Premiership who would, for the first time, have broken free of the ties that they share with the Union when it comes to TV rights.
The sale of international rugby combined with the club game was always deemed necessary because the club game could not hope to raise enough interest from viewers for any TV company to make a worthwhile bid.
Historically, that was true with the old BBC Rugby Special attracting only around 100,000 viewers when showing club games on a Sunday afternoon – but now with pay-to-view TV and the combination with other services, Broadband, Telephone etc. even that relatively small number makes financial sense.
The terms of the agreement does although seem a little odd, with the English clubs offering exclusive coverage of their home games to BT while the other countries have a deal with Sky.
If that remained the same it would effectively leave fans having to buy two different TV packages if they want to watch all the games!
The attempts of the Premiership to sweeten the pill with the announcement of a new three-tier European tournament bringing in countries like Portugal and Russia sounds good and inclusive but with all the talk of merit-based qualification, there is no mention of any form of promotion or relegation.
If my understanding is correct the top two tiers are determined by the various positions of clubs/provinces taking part in the Top14, Premiership and the Pro12.
Those in the top half of each play in the European top tier, those at the bottom play in European tier two, with the winners of tier two gaining automatic entry into the next season’s elite competition.
European tier three seems separated and is purely a series of games between minor nations with no promotion for the winner or relegation for the team at the bottom of tier two.
Other than a re-jigging of selection with more clubs from the Premiership and Top 14 taking tier one places, I can’t see how this structure makes for a more merit based competition, particularly as the Rabo Pro12 teams are the best that their respective countries have.
Even though the French have stated that they are not interested in a purely Anglo/French competition to replace the current Heineken/Amlin games, they are united with the Premiership over entry qualification and timing of the competition for a new or extended deal currently under review.
While I think that a European competition should have as many teams from Europe involved as possible, I agree with the Premiership/Top14 point of view that the Rabo must be a truly competitive league with some sort of prize (European games) for the top teams and punishment (points deduction)  for fielding weakened teams.
Away from Europe, BT is a new source of revenue for rugby and they have a huge ambition to become a much bigger player in the provision of home entertainment (TV, Broadband etc) and they have the money to fund it.
The deal could have massive repercussions for our sport as it may allow rugby to follow football where the Premier League have their own TV money and the FA have theirs and, by having these separate pots, each are able fund their own ambitions without impacting negatively on the other.
In the 17 years since rugby changed, the financial requirements of the professional side of the game have steadily increased and although the Union have increased their profits they have had to drastically cutback on the funding that they traditionally gave to the amateur game.
If the Aviva Premiership can increase the amount of money they generate through their own resources, it may eventually be possible for them to become self funding and not reliant on the various grants and payments from the Union, which would in turn allow the Union to reinvest in the
development of the community game for the benefit of all.