Sustainability the name of the game

Paul Rees reports that all Premiership clubs have released more players than they have recruited

SEVEN of last year’s England World Cup squad have moved to France this summer, joining four of their colleagues who had already made the move across The Channel. It means one-third of those who took the men in white to a third-place finish are lost to the English game.

Twenty-nine international players have left the Premiership this summer and 13 have arrived, six of them capped by Wales, although only Gloucester’s Tomos Williams could be considered a likely starter when fit. Unlike last year, when Finn Russell signed for Bath, none of the game’s A-listers have been drawn to English rugby’s top flight, although Waisea Nyacalevu, the Fiji captain, should give Sale a bounce.

Most of the Test recruits are in their 30s, including Leigh Halfpenny, the Wales and Lions full-back, a pedigree player on the last lap of his career who has joined Harlequins, and the Fiji No.8 Viliame ‘Bill’ Mata, a try scorer against England in last October’s quarter-final against England, who is taking over from Scotland’s Magnus Bradbury at Ashton Gate.

It is a far cry from the days when clubs were happy to spend money they did not have buying up top talent from all over the rugby world. The belief was that investing in squads would more than pay for itself through increased gates, sponsorship and television deals but all it did was pile up debt which became unsustainable when the pandemic blew in and income all but dried up. So even though the salary cap is rising from £5m to £6.4m, there has been no spending splurge as clubs adopt the new government’s mantra of not handing over what they do not have and no marquee additions. Squad sizes are being reduced, something expected to be enshrined in the new agreement between the Rugby Football Union and Premiership Rugby, and more academy players are being given a route to the first team.

Newcastle will operate with a 35-strong squad next season, supplemented by 20 academy hopefuls. The Falcons have finished bottom of the table for the last two seasons and they will not be spending up to the old cap, never mind the new one, as director of rugby Steve Diamond grapples with the dual task of being more competitive on the field and balancing the books off it.

“We have reduced the squad to 35 but we have enhanced it because the players who have come in are better than those who have left,” said Diamond, who has spent the majority of his 23 years in coaching in the Premiership.

“I was right to do the jettison because only two of those who have left have got a job in the Premiership. We have got 20 kids who will be fast-tracked through the academy system and I know that all the other clubs will spend up to the salary cap, no matter what they may say.

“I have been coaching for a long time and I know the kidology that goes on. The only reason they would have to reduce their squad is because they cannot fit all the players in because they are paying them too much.

“You cannot tell me one club apart from Newcastle that has reduced the playing number of the senior squad. We have two very good analysts and statisticians here and we have done the numbers – no one has cut like us.

“We have to win games and make the business sustainable – none is in the Premiership – and that is part of the job I am doing here. The RFU getting naming rights for Twickenham is brilliant for a game that has come through the worst period but is still not out of the water. The more clubs that become sustainable, the better.”

Saracens will have seen their wage bill drop with Owen Farrell and the Vunipolas brothers, Mako and Billy, who all started the 2019 World Cup final against South Africa in Yokohama, moving to France, while Sean Maitland, who was in Scotland’s squad that tournament, has retired.

Sarries have said farewell to 16 senior players, the majority of whom were in their 30s. Some recruits, like Phil Brantingham and Louie Johnson from Newcastle, are players who could be around for a decade or more given the club’s nurturing tradition, while the more experienced arrivals will be plugging holes.

Bristol have been among the more acquisitive clubs since their return to the Premiership six years ago. Semi Radradra and Charles Piutau left at the end of last season and they were followed this summer by four more internationals, including the England and Lions prop Kyle Sinckler and the France centre Virimi Vakatawa. They are 20 players down on last season and have brought in nine. Newcastle and Bristol are at opposite ends of the financial divide, but the Bears’ director of rugby Pat Lam echoes Diamond in the drive for sustainability. “The better we do on the field, the better it is for the commercial team,” he said.

Bristol have the Premiership’s wealthiest owner, Steven Lansdown, but he only ever saw making good losses every year as part of the start-up project under Lam. The emphasis now is on generating revenue which is why the club is taking the path trodden by others and taking a home match to a much bigger stadium.

They will face Bath at Cardiff ‘s Principality Stadium next May, hoping for a 74,000 sell-out. Harlequins hired Twickenham twice last season, drawing an average crowd of 70,000 and Saracens attracted more than 61,000 for their clash with Harlequins at Tottenham Hotspurs’ ground.

The matches themselves are not necessarily money-spinners because of the costs involved but, like owners digging deep in the old days, they are seen as an investment, a way of attracting new supporters and making them want to take another look.

In the past, clubs relied on big names to boost attendances, never mind that much of the rugby served up appealed to connoisseurs rather than the uninitiated. That has changed and last season’s battle for the top four was the most compelling yet, although in the times before the play-offs, the final round match between the top two, Northampton and Bath, at the Recreation Ground would have been a title shoot-out rather than the cup final it turned into at Twickenham a few weeks later.

Bath have made three signings, two experienced forwards, Francois van Wyk and Ross Molony, and one of the most promising players in England, 21-year old Guy Pepper who has joined from Newcastle having trained with England in the summer.

They have released 12 senior players, including full-back Matt Gallagher who has followed the former Harlequins wing Louis Lynagh to Italy and made his Test debut last month. Champions Northampton have lost a welter of experience in Courtney Lawes, Lewis Ludlam, Alex Waller, Paul Hill, Sam Matavesi and Alex Moon. They have recruited two forwards from Saracens, Tom West and Callum Hunter-Hill, along with the Australia back rower Josh Kemeny.

All 10 clubs have released more players than they have hired with the total passing 50, an average of five less each. Newcastle are without 19 players who started last season at Kingston Park and the 15 new faces in their senior squad include seven academy graduates as Diamond looks to distil team spirit. Exeter have made two signings, both from the Championship, and Harlequins three.

The way it is now suits England, more England qualified academy products and fewer imports. Relations between Twickenham and Premiership Rugby have never been more cordial, not least because the club organisation, which in the early days of professionalism felt it should be allowed to operate autonomously, now sees the advantage of a close working relationship.

That may change again if the financial outlook improves, but Premiership Rugby has streamlined its operation. Conflict is bad for business and the deal with the RFU over the release of players is too valuable to jeopardise.

While supporters in the past may have been tempted to Premiership grounds by big names, from Michael Lynagh and Nick Evans to Carlos Spencer and Thomas Castaignede, the prevailing belief now is that fans identify more with homegrown players who have come through the system than those whose stay is likely to be fleeting, no matter how illustrious their careers.

That made for emotional scenes at the end of Northampton’s final home match of the season against Saracens in the play-off semi-final when the long-serving Cortney Lawes, Ludlam, Alex Waller and Alex Moon said their farewells to the Franklin’s Gardens faithful, just as Farrell and the Vunipolas had the previous week at the StoneX Stadium.

It is an era of retrenchment in the Premiership which is why players approaching their last contract have left in numbers with clubs having to look after those with years ahead of them. No more Manu Tuilagi, Jonny May, Lawes, Farrell and other players who for more than a decade held sway in the top flight having come through the system.

They were more the exception than the rule then but economics dictate, and the business for the new season shows that mining for the next Farrell or Lawes is a more productive use of resources than splashing out on a polished gem.