Wasps in the mire - now in administration

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sk 88
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Re: Wasps still in the mire

Post by sk 88 »

GB72 wrote: Mon Aug 08, 2022 1:01 pm
johnthegriff wrote: Mon Aug 08, 2022 12:02 pm The game went professional, the moneymen and sugar daddies moved in mostly at clubs with no assets, they for their own glorification paid high wages and inflated the market creating a situation that made it necessary to earn off field to fund the team, having no assets made that tricky. Wasps with their nomadic history and contempt for their fans have created their own problems but it is not the fault of their supporters who deserve every sympathy. Our game has a future, the players can be paid properly but common sense has to rule, stars if fit must be available for all Premiership games, better paying deals with TV must be agreed and with better exposure to the general public. By some means or other we have to have a two division fully professional league with promotion and relegation and with realistic minimum ground standards.
The TV Deal is the big one and also one that something could be done about with some joined up thinking. The harsh reality is that it is the England rights that eveyone wants (from and English perspective) and so they should be negotiated along with the club rights. Channels that support the club game should benefit from the crown jewels of the England matches. I suspect that the clubs would be able to get a far better deal based on that.

And whilst we are on it, remove the guarantee that the 6 Nations will be on free to air TV. It has been on there forever and it has not grown the game and the game gets very little promotion outside of the matches and so that argument fails. Get the highest bidder in, get the money in the game and watch the winner of the rights promote the hell out of rugby.

With regards divisions and promotion, that should be based on attendance and not ground capacity. We need clubs that can attaract fans not clubs with stunning but empty stadiums.
Agree, and if the BBC still wanted it that would be the best thing of all. Premiership Rugby on the BBC would grow the audience dramatically. The cross promotion on the news, all the radio channels is worth literally hundreds of millions in advertising.
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GB72
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Re: Wasps still in the mire

Post by GB72 »

sk 88 wrote: Tue Aug 09, 2022 11:49 am
GB72 wrote: Mon Aug 08, 2022 1:01 pm
johnthegriff wrote: Mon Aug 08, 2022 12:02 pm The game went professional, the moneymen and sugar daddies moved in mostly at clubs with no assets, they for their own glorification paid high wages and inflated the market creating a situation that made it necessary to earn off field to fund the team, having no assets made that tricky. Wasps with their nomadic history and contempt for their fans have created their own problems but it is not the fault of their supporters who deserve every sympathy. Our game has a future, the players can be paid properly but common sense has to rule, stars if fit must be available for all Premiership games, better paying deals with TV must be agreed and with better exposure to the general public. By some means or other we have to have a two division fully professional league with promotion and relegation and with realistic minimum ground standards.
The TV Deal is the big one and also one that something could be done about with some joined up thinking. The harsh reality is that it is the England rights that eveyone wants (from and English perspective) and so they should be negotiated along with the club rights. Channels that support the club game should benefit from the crown jewels of the England matches. I suspect that the clubs would be able to get a far better deal based on that.

And whilst we are on it, remove the guarantee that the 6 Nations will be on free to air TV. It has been on there forever and it has not grown the game and the game gets very little promotion outside of the matches and so that argument fails. Get the highest bidder in, get the money in the game and watch the winner of the rights promote the hell out of rugby.

With regards divisions and promotion, that should be based on attendance and not ground capacity. We need clubs that can attaract fans not clubs with stunning but empty stadiums.
Agree, and if the BBC still wanted it that would be the best thing of all. Premiership Rugby on the BBC would grow the audience dramatically. The cross promotion on the news, all the radio channels is worth literally hundreds of millions in advertising.
Sadly the BBC have shown time and time again that rugby is very much a second class citizen. I have seen massive rugby matches bumped to Sports Extra on the radio in favour of league 2 football or an FA Cup match. Sadly, when rugby is played in the football season then there is only one winner and the BBC will want nothing more than the biggest internationals. Sadly, if it is not football or Wimbledon, the BBC now have very little interest at all. You will never see live club rugby on the BBC
sk 88
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Re: Wasps still in the mire

Post by sk 88 »

Crofty wrote: Mon Aug 08, 2022 8:06 pm
GB72 wrote: Mon Aug 08, 2022 2:35 pm
Crofty wrote: Mon Aug 08, 2022 2:22 pm I just cannot shake the feeling that taking the 6 Nations and the RWC and stocking them behind a common paywall with the Premiership rather than boosting the Prem will just kill off the international game in England... :smt009
I do understand that but I am not so sure. Even if you sold off the 6 Nations rights, that would only be England home matches so half of the games would still be on free to air.

What I would love is for it all to be on free to air but nobody will pay for or commit to showing 2 or 3 live matches every week. Hell we cannot even get a highlights show on before midnight. All I can see is that the 6 Nations is the crown jewel of england rugby and it should be used as a bargaining chip for the good of the game as a whole, be it through access, promotion or cold hard cash. At present you cannot even get the RFU to promote the club game (look at social media feeds during the off weeks in the 6 nations when the official accounts ask people what they are doing with no rugby on) and so I just feel that some change is necesary. If it has to stay on free to air TV then I would give the rights to channel 4 for at least making some effort to show club matches.
You do realise this is because the Premiership isn't really the RFU's product, it's a privately owned league shared between 13 clubs and CVC, the RFU has no financial stake so of course they don't spend their money promoting it. That's the root cause of the schism and it's more the clubs fault than the RFU sad to say...
The RFU's attitude towards the clubs is entirely its own and its attitude towards us the supporters has always been pathetic. It doesn't cost any money at all to talk about and interact with club accounts on social media to use your profile to help build others.

The clubs correctly recognised that they could not have the RFU cuckoo in the nest. Bill Beaumont was still talking about the RFU taking over the clubs in 2002, 7 years into professionalism even though it was a totally discredited idea from the start.

The club game (limited to the Prem 13, let alone the Champ & national leagues) has grown massively recently and is now consistently bigger in revenue terms than the RFU, with the % difference having never been larger (the gross amount was larger pre-covid but we've shrunk less than them) despite the RFU slashing c.£25m per year out of the professional game at Prem, Champ & Women's since 2018. That's in their annual reports if the press ever bothered to read them and report on them.

There is a lot of miss information out there about the RFU's finances and how good they are as opposed to the clubs. It is simply not the case and the week to week nature of the Premiership was rapidly growing pre-covid and is in a good shape to grow again in the 2020s. From 2010 to 2019 PRL club's revenues collectively doubled.
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GB72
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Re: Wasps still in the mire

Post by GB72 »

sk 88 wrote: Tue Aug 09, 2022 11:59 am
Crofty wrote: Mon Aug 08, 2022 8:06 pm
GB72 wrote: Mon Aug 08, 2022 2:35 pm

I do understand that but I am not so sure. Even if you sold off the 6 Nations rights, that would only be England home matches so half of the games would still be on free to air.

What I would love is for it all to be on free to air but nobody will pay for or commit to showing 2 or 3 live matches every week. Hell we cannot even get a highlights show on before midnight. All I can see is that the 6 Nations is the crown jewel of england rugby and it should be used as a bargaining chip for the good of the game as a whole, be it through access, promotion or cold hard cash. At present you cannot even get the RFU to promote the club game (look at social media feeds during the off weeks in the 6 nations when the official accounts ask people what they are doing with no rugby on) and so I just feel that some change is necesary. If it has to stay on free to air TV then I would give the rights to channel 4 for at least making some effort to show club matches.
You do realise this is because the Premiership isn't really the RFU's product, it's a privately owned league shared between 13 clubs and CVC, the RFU has no financial stake so of course they don't spend their money promoting it. That's the root cause of the schism and it's more the clubs fault than the RFU sad to say...
The RFU's attitude towards the clubs is entirely its own and its attitude towards us the supporters has always been pathetic. It doesn't cost any money at all to talk about and interact with club accounts on social media to use your profile to help build others.

The clubs correctly recognised that they could not have the RFU cuckoo in the nest. Bill Beaumont was still talking about the RFU taking over the clubs in 2002, 7 years into professionalism even though it was a totally discredited idea from the start.

The club game (limited to the Prem 13, let alone the Champ & national leagues) has grown massively recently and is now consistently bigger in revenue terms than the RFU, with the % difference having never been larger (the gross amount was larger pre-covid but we've shrunk less than them) despite the RFU slashing c.£25m per year out of the professional game at Prem, Champ & Women's since 2018. That's in their annual reports if the press ever bothered to read them and report on them.

There is a lot of miss information out there about the RFU's finances and how good they are as opposed to the clubs. It is simply not the case and the week to week nature of the Premiership was rapidly growing pre-covid and is in a good shape to grow again in the 2020s. From 2010 to 2019 PRL club's revenues collectively doubled.
That is all really interesting. I understood the RFU were on shakey ground and hence the need to get as many matches to Twickenham as possible (including pointless pre tour friendlies against the BaaBaas etc). The big concern is that the court case over head injuries could actually break the RFU.

As for the club finances, i am less clear on that and some of my figures in my head are a bit dated. Are the clubs anywhere near breaking even each year now? If they could get to that, it would be a victory in itself.
sk 88
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Re: Wasps still in the mire

Post by sk 88 »

GB72 wrote: Tue Aug 09, 2022 10:35 am Ont thing that I thought that I would never even consider is that rugby may even have to consider moving the season. I am very much against this for a number of reasons but, from a commercial point of view, the sport is currently competing for fans and TV money against Premier League Football and, as a result, are being steamrollered with barely any coverage in printed, TV or online media. Perhaps playing when there is no football could help increase interest. Lets face it, rugby has no chance against the relentless onslaught of the football premier league marketing and PR teams.
I think that misunderstands the market in the UK.

yes there is football in the winter but that is about it. There are loads of events all summer long, and rugby is considerably less enjoyable in 30 degree heat than in a nice cosy 8 degree early winter or spring day.

Rugby isn't competing with football in a zero sum game, it's competing in the wider sports-events-entertainment market and in the wider market there is considerably less on in the summer. For instance delaying the Premiership final last season pushed it into a clash with Royal Ascot which is why the final was on ITV4 not ITV1.

Football draws massive crowds but still only about 5% of the biggest towns populations, there are 95% of the rest of the people to look at, before we consider many people have the time & means to support both. On TV a big club match gets c.1-4million, there are sill 66-63m other people in the country. And that's at times where there is a direct clash.
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sk 88
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Re: Wasps still in the mire

Post by sk 88 »

GB72 wrote: Tue Aug 09, 2022 12:07 pm
sk 88 wrote: Tue Aug 09, 2022 11:59 am
Crofty wrote: Mon Aug 08, 2022 8:06 pm

You do realise this is because the Premiership isn't really the RFU's product, it's a privately owned league shared between 13 clubs and CVC, the RFU has no financial stake so of course they don't spend their money promoting it. That's the root cause of the schism and it's more the clubs fault than the RFU sad to say...
The RFU's attitude towards the clubs is entirely its own and its attitude towards us the supporters has always been pathetic. It doesn't cost any money at all to talk about and interact with club accounts on social media to use your profile to help build others.

The clubs correctly recognised that they could not have the RFU cuckoo in the nest. Bill Beaumont was still talking about the RFU taking over the clubs in 2002, 7 years into professionalism even though it was a totally discredited idea from the start.

The club game (limited to the Prem 13, let alone the Champ & national leagues) has grown massively recently and is now consistently bigger in revenue terms than the RFU, with the % difference having never been larger (the gross amount was larger pre-covid but we've shrunk less than them) despite the RFU slashing c.£25m per year out of the professional game at Prem, Champ & Women's since 2018. That's in their annual reports if the press ever bothered to read them and report on them.

There is a lot of miss information out there about the RFU's finances and how good they are as opposed to the clubs. It is simply not the case and the week to week nature of the Premiership was rapidly growing pre-covid and is in a good shape to grow again in the 2020s. From 2010 to 2019 PRL club's revenues collectively doubled.
That is all really interesting. I understood the RFU were on shakey ground and hence the need to get as many matches to Twickenham as possible (including pointless pre tour friendlies against the BaaBaas etc). The big concern is that the court case over head injuries could actually break the RFU.

As for the club finances, i am less clear on that and some of my figures in my head are a bit dated. Are the clubs anywhere near breaking even each year now? If they could get to that, it would be a victory in itself.
It really depends what we mean by breaking even. Newcastle turned on operating profit this season (20/21 reporting period). With the new structure on the CVC/PRL invested units roughly half the clubs are reporting paper profits in most years as those shares keep being revalued up (last season by £3.5m adding c.£40m of profit to the collective balance sheet). Tigers in the past ten years have usually been reporting a paper loss but with a positive cash flow as depreciation of the costs of building the two stands have unwound. Is that breaking even? I've say yes, most people would say no. In a "real" business paying dividends to its shareholders that would be a concern, in a not-for-profit business where no one takes a dividend it's really not the same thing.

Who owns the debt is massively important. Saracens at one point were in £50m of debt but it was all owed to Nigel Wray who was never going to call it in and eventually wrote it off. Wasps debt is predominantly commercial debt that very much needs to be paid off to terms.

So .... yes & no!
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Re: Wasps still in the mire

Post by LE18 »

Playing Devil's Advocate, ban all sport from TV, folks would have to get off their backsides and go watch "live" matches. Yes I know, no money etc etc. Sadly my bowls club's match is not on tele tonight so I am off to watch it live. Long live live sport! :smt005
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Re: Wasps still in the mire

Post by Grimlish »

At risk of bringing an interesting discussion back towards its starting point, have just seen this statement from Wasps about the pitch at the stadium- not the only issue or even the biggest issue but still an essential component of what’s going on there.

https://www.wasps.co.uk/news/wasps-grou ... e-officer/
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Re: Wasps still in the mire

Post by Ian Cant »

Rugby a Union at club level will never be as popular as football so needs to work incredibly hard to build its’ support from young families to returning or new older members.
For many years I’ve supported Tigers at home ( never miss a league or Euro game) and as many away games as possible but whereas preCovid, games v Saints would have been sell outs, this season the ones at Welford Road weren’t ( I went to Franklin’s but because it was a great win cannot recall if it was sold out!). Leicester City on the other hand continue to have sell outs for nearly every game.
At Sale, Wasps, Irish, Worcester, Newcastle last season Tigers remain the team to watch! But, attendances at those clubs remain low.
Wasps have never had large attendance, I remember Lawrence D, in the days when Wasps were winning in the Premiership and Europe, moaning about the lack of support compared to Leicester!
With some of my friends, who were season ticket holders, the reason they don’t get season tickets is because of the number of matches internationals don’t play for their clubs!
Wasps worked hard to build support when they moved to The Ricoh but sadly alienated their core support: in fact I know of some Wasps fans who moved to the Midlands because of their work but now follow Tigers at Welford Road and support Wasps when they come to Tigers.
For all some fans don’t like them, Sarries promote their club very well, as do Bath, Gloucester, Quins and Saints.
Personally I’d like to see less Internationals to both avoid player burn out and to have no club games on 6 Nations match days. Impossible!
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Re: Wasps still in the mire

Post by loretta »

Grimlish wrote: Tue Aug 09, 2022 9:31 pm At risk of bringing an interesting discussion back towards its starting point, have just seen this statement from Wasps about the pitch at the stadium- not the only issue or even the biggest issue but still an essential component of what’s going on there.

https://www.wasps.co.uk/news/wasps-grou ... e-officer/
I think Mr Vaughan is feeling a bit tetchy!
Last edited by loretta on Wed Aug 10, 2022 9:18 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Wasps still in the mire

Post by Hot_Charlie »

loretta wrote: Wed Aug 10, 2022 8:24 am
Grimlish wrote: Tue Aug 09, 2022 9:31 pm At risk of bringing an interesting discussion back towards its starting point, have just seen this statement from Wasps about the pitch at the stadium- not the only issue or even the biggest issue but still an essential component of what’s going on there.

https://www.wasps.co.uk/news/wasps-grou ... e-officer/
I think Mr Vaughan is feeling a bit tetchy!
There is zero good news surrounding his club. If the mood on social media platforms is accurate his club are hated by some of the local population, particularly Coventry City fans who have seen their club suffer under the terms of various deals with Arena Coventry and subsequently Wasps and want them gone.

Don't blame him really :smt003 !
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Re: Wasps still in the mire

Post by GB72 »

Thing is, that statement does nothing to actually quash any of the rumours. It says that the football club knew about the potential pitch issues but does not explain why no work has started yet and does nothing to actually quell any of the rumours about the bigger issues surrounding the club.

To my uneducated eye, it looks like a heavy handed attempt to stop media stories that could impact on their attempts to refinance rather than anything that adds any confidence in the club#s position going forward.

Surely the league need to step in to get the relevant assurances that the club can complete the season.
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Re: Wasps still in the mire

Post by loretta »

Imagine the mess if they went under mid season.
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Re: Wasps still in the mire

Post by TigerFeetSteve »

loretta wrote: Wed Aug 10, 2022 9:12 am Imagine the mess if they went under mid season.
They may not make midseason at this rate.

I think it's Friday that the payment of £35million on their stadium is now due.
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Re: Wasps still in the mire

Post by GB72 »

TigerFeetSteve wrote: Wed Aug 10, 2022 9:24 am
loretta wrote: Wed Aug 10, 2022 9:12 am Imagine the mess if they went under mid season.
They may not make midseason at this rate.

I think it's Friday that the payment of £35million on their stadium is now due.
Whilst I strongly believe that much is just wishful thinking on the part of the football club fans, there seems to be a lot of people on social media who are convinced that the creditors are going to pull the plug on the club this week.
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