Rebel league is not for the good of rugby, it is a simple cash grab

Telegraph

4 hours ago

Watching the exciting Premiership semi-final between Bath and Bristol, I realised how much I enjoyed the game. We know the Premiership has its difficulties, but the present product is not one of them. This was a game that was as fast-paced and exciting as you could realistically hope to see.
This reaction led me to revisit the news about the creation of R360. Their released prospectus for a rebel league proposes the establishment of a 'grand prix' model of 12 franchises (eight male; four female) and it has been reported that they want to attract the top 300 male and female players, many of whom have allegedly signed heads of agreement to participate.
Figurehead Mike Tindall claimed in the prospectus that 'clubs around the world are feeling the strain and are being propped up by the international game,' and that 'rugby's lack of innovation and ability to change risks losing its appeal to new audiences and its younger market.'
It is claimed that a mixture of Formula One, cricket's Indian Premier League and other institutional investors have expressed interest. There were widely reported aims of producing a 'faster-paced, more exciting format, and a focus on player and fan experience' and a league that 'emphasises player welfare, including mental health support and opportunities for players to build personal brands'. It is said the new teams will visit 16 international venues, including the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, Nou Camp and MorumBIS in Sao Paulo.
As there are no specifically named investors or broadcasters, and nor are there any details of where the proposed franchises are to be based, what is the reality?
Take the less interesting, but crucial, issue of squad numbers. If you assume two thirds of the 300 players are proposed for the eight male teams, you get squads of 25. There is no way that a team carrying that size of squad could compete over the proposed two sets of eight games per season. Even if you had a realistic minimum of two players for each position you would need squads of 30, and just a couple of injuries to props would mean teams could not cover the safety law requirements for specialist front-row replacements. A more realistic number of players would be a minimum of 500 but let us be generous and take 30 per squad.
If you were to double the typical salary, as reported, then you could say eight 30-player squads of athletes on around £500,000 could cost £120 million per annum. The Premiership's current overall salary to total costs ratio is 45:55, so annual running costs for the new league could then be roughly £270 million a year. If you took a very, very substantial assumption that the new league would attract around the same annual broadcast income of all rugby's current major competitions, this would produce about £150 million, meaning to break even each of the 64 proposed games would need to make £1.9 million profit.
This does not include costs on start-up or for staging games at the claimed venues. So again we ask: realistic or not? Now try doing the sums with 500 players.
If R360 wants to make claims, it must answer questions properly. When they highlight the fan and player experience, what exactly do they mean and how will they improve it? It is not good enough to criticise without definition or rely on some Field of Dreams -like 'If you build it, they will come'. How do they propose to fulfil their stated aim for a faster-paced and more exciting game? Which laws, if any, are they going to change? These claims need evidencing and how will any proposed changes address their vaunted claim about player welfare? What do they propose for the British and Irish Lions?
We go on. Where are these franchises to be based? The current Premiership proposals at least target existing clubs and supporters. Where will these new fans come from? I presume R360 think that international fans, and completely new supporters, can be converted with their new format, but there is little evidence that this is achievable.
Without the support of the unions and World Rugby, the new league cannot exist and why would the current rugby structure allow R360 to simply take its best players, leaving the current, struggling structure to bear all the costs of grass-roots rugby, academy rugby and the emasculated professional leagues that would be left behind? Why would the current game allow a handful of venture capital firms or billionaires to walk off with its top assets without a fight? If it comes to a showdown, the only real sanction the unions have is to disbar R360's players from their international teams. It is a battle they do not need but would be forced to enter.
What nobody dares say is that the central purpose of challenger brands like R360 is to damage existing and competing brands, like Kerry Packer's World Series Cricket. This is not a proposal for the good of rugby – it is a simple cash grab.