A friend has just drawn my attention to this article in The Guardian newspaper this week regarding the state of England’s 10 remaining rugby premiership teams,
https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2024/sep/26/premiership-rugby-troubles-laid-bare-by-report
It doesn’t make for happy reading; first as a rugby fan, a premiership which only involves three teams reduces the sport’s reach but as a business person, I am not sure how any organisation can trade insolvently without their shareholders and directors being held to account. They have a duty of responsability to the team, their fans and the reputation of the sport both at home and abroad.
I’d love to see a break down of their accounts to see where the cash from sales of tickets, merchansiding and stall concessions on match and other corporate days have gone. A good forensic accountant could easily do this and provide some much needed information that could help to not only mend any holes, but lay out a financial plan for the future to overcome the issue and ensure that it doesn’t happen again.
One of the issues highlighted in the article relates to wages (as high as 92% of revenue in the case of Sale Sharks). I can understand the oeer present need to have high profile players at Club level, but why not drop your expectations and look to see what talent is not being allowed to shine because people are paying too much attention on seducing the big names?
With supporters already having to pay so many different subscriptions to watch their teams play across the various tournaments and BBC’s recent announcement that they may no longer be able to afford to run the 6Nations, the sport will wither even further. It’s a game that needs to be watched; reading text update just don’t give people any excitement and for us girls, we need to see those rugby player muscles !
I truly hope that the shortfalls in cash have occured despite everyone’s best efforts and a solution can be found for the sport we love.
