SRU buying Warriors (Worcester version)

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Re: SRU buying Warriors (Worcester version)

Postby gowrie on Tue Dec 12, 2017 3:22 pm

EWT spoons wrote:1. ...


But that still leaves the question of how Worcester are losing money after all those revenue streams. And given all the issues Worcester face, surely the fact they're drawing twice the crowd in a smaller city indicate that their current board isn't all that bad? And records crowds for Scottish teams are good, but relatively still not very big. After all, the SRU don't just need to be better, they need to be absolutely, hugely better to turn around the losses Worcester are making. I don't see why there's any reason to believe they are, not that they're incompetent, but are they financial wizards?

EWT spoons wrote:2. ...


But again, what happens with the EQP payments? Clubs will only care about a player's allegiances when it becomes formal, and they're capped and tied to us, someone can say they dream about playing for Scotland all they like, but until they actually do it, the clubs still get paid. So we're talking about players who are capped and solely SQ at this point, and there has to be a limit of how many of those we can play at this team, otherwise we'll lose the EQP funding. It's the exact same calculation all the other clubs are making, the only difference is we might show a bias towards Scottish tied players ahead of NZ, SA or other non-English players. But that's not going to be more than 2-3 players max, is it really worth it?
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Re: SRU buying Warriors (Worcester version)

Postby EWT spoons on Tue Dec 12, 2017 4:36 pm

1. Worcester are losing money as they are clearly not being well run, fan numbers don’t change that. Fans will come and see their team regardless of how well managed the teams finances are. I certainly wouldn’t stop going to games because Edinburgh are losing money, so not really sure how relevant your point there is. They are also drawing twice the numbers in an area that isn’t competing to the same level with football, so there is that to consider as well, which again is another reason why I think there is an opportunity to boost attendances further.

Granted the crowd sizes are still not massive, but Glasgow are a sell out most weeks, the only thing stopping them getting bigger numbers is stadium size.

In terms of financial wizards, no idea, but they could benefit from economies of scale with their suppliers to reduce costs (non playing obviously) and work with sponsors to further increase revenue coming into the club. I’m not saying that Worcester are going to be up challenging for the league either under their stewardship, but as long as they are lower/mid table then that is an improvement.


2. Clubs get paid for having 70% of their match day squad made up of EQ players, so 16 of the 23 need to be EQ, that leaves 7 players in a match day squad who don’t have to be EQ. Now if they were all Scottish that is decent representation, or if they are dual qualified then that number of 7 goes up further. As far as I can see it doesn’t matter how many are in your squad overall so as long as there are enough to meet that 70% threshold on a match day the club would be fine. Also if player ‘x’ is SQ but doesn’t want to relocate up to Scotland then this is a viable option to keep him under the SRU control and encourage him to become available for Scotland because he won’t be at risk of losing his place, to the same level as with other clubs in the Aviva. Do you see what I mean?
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Re: SRU buying Warriors (Worcester version)

Postby gowrie on Tue Dec 12, 2017 6:38 pm

As mentioned before, Edinburgh are running at a loss, if that's the basis for saying if a board is doing a good/bad job, the SRU doesn't have a great track record to boast of before getting involved in what is going to be an incredibly difficult job.
And although there's no major football competition, perhaps part of the reason is that Worcester simply isn't a very big place. It's 1/5th the size of Edinburgh, the fact that they pull twice the crowd that we do isn't a point in the SRUs favour. There's no low-hanging fruit left to pick, and basing the decision to take control on imagining another £5m suddenly coming in is plain reckless.

The SQ players thing is still wishful thinking to me. A player doesn't want to move to Scotland, fine, but what does Worcester offer that Edinburgh/Glasgow don't if we're assuming the players are moving? Is the SRU going to be spending more money for SQ players in England than it will here? If the SRU offer them improved rest/management, who picks up the slack? Will there be a larger squad, or will we run the other players down to manage a player who hasn't even committed to international rugby yet?

Also with the EQP payments, there's still no change. Because at most there are 7 places for non-English players, and having the SRU in charge doesn't change that. As I said before, it may mean that all of those 7 places are taken by Scottish players, but that's it. Imagine those 7 are in the team, what does another player do if they want to play for Scotland? They face the same decision as they would elsewhere.
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Re: SRU buying Warriors (Worcester version)

Postby joe soap on Tue Dec 12, 2017 8:19 pm

gowrie wrote:As mentioned before, Edinburgh are running at a loss, if that's the basis for saying if a board is doing a good/bad job, the SRU doesn't have a great track record to boast of before getting involved in what is going to be an incredibly difficult job.


I think you and EWT are both making good points if coming from opposite extremes, but I don't think the above is either a fair or correct argument.

Edinburgh (and Glasgow) are run on a different system to AP teams, both depend hugely on money from their union, lots of it. Substitute SRU for sugar daddy and its the same set up.
But my main point is this - whatever anyone thinks about the SRU or or whether they like or dislike Dodson, the SRU under Dodson have turned a profit for several seasons while paying down a huge debt an increasing funding b 50% to both teams since he took over - I'd say that is a pretty damned good track record of financial and economic competence
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Re: SRU buying Warriors (Worcester version)

Postby gowrie on Tue Dec 12, 2017 8:28 pm

joe soap wrote:
gowrie wrote:As mentioned before, Edinburgh are running at a loss, if that's the basis for saying if a board is doing a good/bad job, the SRU doesn't have a great track record to boast of before getting involved in what is going to be an incredibly difficult job.


I think you and EWT are both making good points if coming from opposite extremes, but I don't think the above is either a fair or correct argument.

Edinburgh (and Glasgow) are run on a different system to AP teams, both depend hugely on money from their union, lots of it. Substitute SRU for sugar daddy and its the same set up.
But my main point is this - whatever anyone thinks about the SRU or or whether they like or dislike Dodson, the SRU under Dodson have turned a profit for several seasons while paying down a huge debt an increasing funding b 50% to both teams since he took over - I'd say that is a pretty damned good track record of financial and economic competence


I wasn't meaning to say the SRU/Dodson aren't good at their jobs, they are. What I was challenging was the idea that the Worcester board must be bad at theirs, from a simple read of their books. They're surely not perfect, but how much better would the SRU be, in a market they have absolutely no experience or knowledge of? Is the marginal improvement of our CEO for theirs £5m?
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Re: SRU buying Warriors (Worcester version)

Postby joe soap on Tue Dec 12, 2017 9:36 pm

gowrie wrote:I wasn't meaning to say the SRU/Dodson aren't good at their jobs, they are. What I was challenging was the idea that the Worcester board must be bad at theirs, from a simple read of their books. They're surely not perfect, but how much better would the SRU be, in a market they have absolutely no experience or knowledge of? Is the marginal improvement of our CEO for theirs £5m?


I would agree that without detailed sight of their books its impossible to say whether they are well run or not, why the losses have occurred, so it could cut both ways - very well run or disastrously, or more likely somewhere in between
It is a different market, and I doubt Dodson would be trying to run it directly
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Re: SRU buying Warriors (Worcester version)

Postby germain on Wed Dec 13, 2017 10:36 pm

EWT spoons wrote:Clubs get paid for having 70% of their match day squad made up of EQ players, so 16 of the 23 need to be EQ, that leaves 7 players in a match day squad who don’t have to be EQ. Now if they were all Scottish that is decent representation, or if they are dual qualified then that number of 7 goes up further. As far as I can see it doesn’t matter how many are in your squad overall so as long as there are enough to meet that 70% threshold on a match day the club would be fine. Also if player ‘x’ is SQ but doesn’t want to relocate up to Scotland then this is a viable option to keep him under the SRU control and encourage him to become available for Scotland because he won’t be at risk of losing his place, to the same level as with other clubs in the Aviva. Do you see what I mean?


No, I don't. I think Gowrie has a point here.
You'll never have just scottish players as foreign players in an english team. You'll have also fidjians, tongans, welsh, south-africans, new-zealanders, etc... So you'll have about 3, 4 or 5 scottish players in a match day squad. We already have that regularly at Newcastle, at LI and for free.
And we have easily two or three scottish players by club in the Aviva. Do we really need SRU to take control of a english club and to spend its money for Aviva ? It will not broaden the scottish players base very much (not at all as far as I can see).
And scottish players that have been able to get a deal in the Aviva don't really need to be under SRU control (and even more so the internationalists who moved south for financial reasons).
But maybe there's something I don't understand.

A third pro team in Scotland is maybe much harder to build, but also much more relevant to broaden the scottish players base.
And now is maybe the right time as Pro14 want to expand. It could be interesting to replace the italian teams by a new south-african team and a scottish one...
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Re: SRU buying Warriors (Worcester version)

Postby royc on Thu Dec 14, 2017 9:10 am

germain wrote:
A third pro team in Scotland is maybe much harder to build, but also much more relevant to broaden the scottish players base.
And now is maybe the right time as Pro14 want to expand. It could be interesting to replace the italian teams by a new south-african team and a scottish one...


I don't believe that having another Pro team would of itself 'broaden the Scottish player base' very much, if at all. The problem is that the player base is pretty small. There are only 27 state schools (out of more than 300!) able to field one team per age grade and play a few league fixtures per season, the rest are playing fitba. Fortunately, the two dozen private schools continue to produce a conveyor belt of young players, but the overall pool is rather thin.

There appear to be a good number in the Academies, but reality is most of them will not get as far as a Pro contract, there will maybe be enough good ones to top-up the home-grown contingents at Edinburgh and Warriors but I don't think there is any great surplus of talented players ready to fill out a third Pro team.

Starting a third Pro team won't change that much, you might get a local uptick in the number of youths playing rugby but not really on a scale to support a Pro team.

The other problem is cost, a Pro team costs something like £9m, IIRC from the SRU's accounts, not just £5m odds for the squad bill. The SRU has nothing like that kind of money available, it has a small operating profit. That is without factoring in the issue of where they would play and the cost of a suitable venue. Aberdeen is I gather the favoured location for a third Pro team, being the third largest city. The best available club ground there is probably Rubislaw, the stand there seats 150 if I recall, you would need to start from scratch on the facilities side.

I feel that the SRU's halfway house of a Super Six, plus investing some limited cash in Lille and Stade Nicois and maybe in Worcester, is sensible from both the player numbers and financial point of view. Plus placing a greater emphasis on identifying SQ players elsewhere. After a few years of the Super Six, new options may open up to turn one of the clubs into a Pro-development one - IF the cash is there.

Out of curiosity, why would we want to replace the Italian teams in the Pro 14, they are both improving this season?
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Re: SRU buying Warriors (Worcester version)

Postby biffer on Thu Dec 14, 2017 9:23 am

The Italians have brought nothing in terms of rugby or revenue.

It may be of more use to them and to rugby generally if there was a Euro10/12 consisting of teams from Italy, Romania, Russia and Georgia.
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Re: SRU buying Warriors (Worcester version)

Postby royc on Thu Dec 14, 2017 9:33 am

biffer wrote:The Italians have brought nothing in terms of rugby or revenue.

It may be of more use to them and to rugby generally if there was a Euro10/12 consisting of teams from Italy, Romania, Russia and Georgia.


Well, they are at least beating a couple of the Welsh teams now and of course Benetton beat us earlier this season, so they can't be too far off the pace in the lower half of the league! Re revenue, do they not pay £250k to each of the 10 home nation clubs, that was the original deal but it may have been watered down? If they still do, that is 10% of our squad budget.

Of course it would be handy if they brought big Italian media sponsorship with them, but as the Irish, Welsh and Scots don't either, we can hardly complain.
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Re: SRU buying Warriors (Worcester version)

Postby germain on Thu Dec 14, 2017 12:36 pm

royc wrote:
The other problem is cost, a Pro team costs something like £9m, IIRC from the SRU's accounts, not just £5m odds for the squad bill. The SRU has nothing like that kind of money available, it has a small operating profit. That is without factoring in the issue of where they would play and the cost of a suitable venue. Aberdeen is I gather the favoured location for a third Pro team, being the third largest city. The best available club ground there is probably Rubislaw, the stand there seats 150 if I recall, you would need to start from scratch on the facilities side.

I feel that the SRU's halfway house of a Super Six, plus investing some limited cash in Lille and Stade Nicois and maybe in Worcester, is sensible from both the player numbers and financial point of view. Plus placing a greater emphasis on identifying SQ players elsewhere. After a few years of the Super Six, new options may open up to turn one of the clubs into a Pro-development one - IF the cash is there.

Out of curiosity, why would we want to replace the Italian teams in the Pro 14, they are both improving this season?


I understand the financial problem. And maybe with this in mind, it could be a smart idea to develop links with clubs outside ouf Scotland.
But I fear than taking control of a club in Aviva is just strengthening a league which attract scottish qualified players who just want a pro deal that the only 70/80 professionnal options available in Scotland can't offer. The biggest problem is not that we don't have enough players for the pro game, but that we don't have enough pro deals for them.

And for the Italians, it's nothing against them. I just think that the path of developpement choosen by the FIR is wrong. Instead of provincial structures, they should let club rugby develop by itself and become professionnal (or not). It's maybe not realistic in Scotland but it is in Italy. I feel that even with hight quality coaches and players, their two provinces will struggle at the end of the season. I really think it would be better for the italian rugby to get out of the Pro14.
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Re: SRU buying Warriors (Worcester version)

Postby Wottie on Sat Dec 23, 2017 11:01 am

Saw that Alan Solomons has been appointed DOR at Worcester Warriors. 2.5 year deal. That surely doesn’t point to an imminent purchase (or more likely assuming operational control) by the SRU does it?
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Re: SRU buying Warriors (Worcester version)

Postby GaryIPA on Sat Dec 23, 2017 12:20 pm

Wat h a bit of the game last night. Denton looked ok but needs to sort his f hair out
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Re: SRU buying Warriors (Worcester version)

Postby The Feral Goat on Sat Dec 23, 2017 1:17 pm

GaryIPA wrote:Wat h a bit of the game last night. Denton looked ok but needs to sort his f hair out


Watched a bit as well, TonySpreadbury poor rugby. L.I. Looked like they know nothing about defence, bamboozled by kicks behind and not even matching up numbers in set piece defence. Can't see them not getting relegated this season.
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Re: SRU buying Warriors (Worcester version)

Postby Frenchy on Sat Dec 23, 2017 9:51 pm

GaryIPA wrote:Wat h a bit of the game last night. Denton looked ok but needs to sort his f hair out


Of all the lessons one could learn from Richard Hibbard, hair style probably isn't the best option.
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