Edinburgh Rugby Squad 2018/19

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Re: Edinburgh Rugby Squad 2018/19

Postby royc on Wed Mar 14, 2018 10:23 pm

joe soap wrote: Its not just that the context of the quotes you refer to being the super 6 and thus not intended to be specific but relative to £1m budgets, the CEO reported the budget figures to the AGM, confirmed by another poster as being as posted earlier by me. On top of that the SRU income has grown well over those 2 years or so. Yet you continue to assert cuts, or shrinking budgets, which £4-5M would be.


Look, it was [the CEO himself who gave the figure of £4-5m for the Pro team squad budgets, I didn't dream it up.

Dodson told us at the SGM two years ago that the squad budgets were around £4.8m for Embra and £5.2m for Glasgow. If he is still saying, two years later - as he is - that the budgets are still '£4-5m, it suggests pretty strongly that Embra is frozen on just about where it was in 2016. Surely that penny has to drop at some point?

You offer no contradictory evidence or anything factual, just an off-the-wall assumption that, because the SRU's income is (marginally) up, Embra will be OK. You do not factor in the many competing claims and priorities on the SRU's current agenda, including (a) trying to buy into an Aviva club, (b) building a mini-Murrayfield on the back pitches, with a likely £1m artificial pitch surface, (c) putting money into Stade Nicois and (d) an £800k contribution to the Super 6, coming to a cinema near you pretty soon.

If you have anything more concrete, happy to look at it. A priori assertions and guesswork, not so much.
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Re: Edinburgh Rugby Squad 2018/19

Postby dolf_lundgren on Mon Mar 19, 2018 3:24 pm

Another issue is only having 2 home games this season in the 6n, could be a hit of a coupe of million to the overall income. Not sure how the cash is being split in the autumn for the trip to Wales, which seems only to be for the benefit of the coffers. It will by the way have a knock on effect on Edin & Glas as we are likely to have to miss out on players again in the league for that game.
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Re: Edinburgh Rugby Squad 2018/19

Postby The Feral Goat on Mon Mar 19, 2018 3:57 pm

Surely the budgeting is being done over a longer period than a single season you have 5 home games every 2 years, 10 every 4 etc with contracts tending to be 2 years and then a few at 1 or 3 year it should not be too difficult (Even for the SRU) to budget appropriately.
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Re: Edinburgh Rugby Squad 2018/19

Postby biffer on Mon Mar 19, 2018 4:06 pm

The Feral Goat wrote:Surely the budgeting is being done over a longer period than a single season you have 5 home games every 2 years, 10 every 4 etc with contracts tending to be 2 years and then a few at 1 or 3 year it should not be too difficult (Even for the SRU) to budget appropriately.


Yep. We dont budget by individual years when signing multi year contracts.
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Re: Edinburgh Rugby Squad 2018/19

Postby royc on Mon Mar 19, 2018 5:22 pm

The Pro teams still have a fixed squad (i.e. player) budget for the season, which doesn't seem to change much year-on-year.

The clue is in the 'International and professional rugby' section of the SRU annual accounts, which covers I think Scott Johnson's Performance Rugby department. I haven't looked at the accounts for a while now, but IIRC the figure hadn't changed too much over 3 seasons, once inflation and academies were factored in.

Cockerill is I think working on a fixed, and I'd imagine pretty tight, budget. Whether he signs a player for one year or three, the total for the 'around 40' squad has to fit inside that budget each season.
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Re: Edinburgh Rugby Squad 2018/19

Postby royc on Mon Mar 19, 2018 6:31 pm

Indeedie, having checked, the SRU's spend on international and professional rugby has hardly increased over the last 4 years, viz:

2013/14: £23.614m
2014/15: £22.761m
2015/16: £23.998m
2016/17: £24.967m

That's an increase of 5.7% over 4 years, or average 1.4% a year, which is not even keeping pace with inflation.

As the number of Pro and international players and staff has hardly changed, nor the number of international and pro games, it points to the Pro teams being kept on a very tight financial leash and having, in real terms, less to spend on players than 4 years ago (and probably 5 years, when we see this year's accounts).

I take no pleasure in likely being on the money about the team being on a frozen budget. Not sure the SRU has got its budget priorities right here. Investing in an Aviva team etc may be a grand idea, but surely getting competitive domestic Pro rugby squads capable of challenging for league and Cup silverware (= wonga) should be a high priority?
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Re: Edinburgh Rugby Squad 2018/19

Postby liveinhope on Mon Mar 19, 2018 7:03 pm

Thus making it even more important Edinburgh qualify for the Champions Cup my recollection being from discussion about this on previous seasons is that simply qualifying is worth several hundred thousand pounds per place for the respective unions. So a jump up to the CC after 3 (?) seasons in the Challenge Cup will be a welcome boost to SRU coffers.In which case far more important Edinburgh make sure of 3rd place in our conference than make progress in the Challenge Cup-though both would be nice!
Anyone able to confirm I've got this (approximately) right?
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Re: Edinburgh Rugby Squad 2018/19

Postby royc on Mon Mar 19, 2018 8:29 pm

I'm sure you're right LIH about the financial boost from being in the Champions Cup but I never found any breakdown of how much.

At the time the Cup was set up, in 2014, Wales Online said there would be £24m for the Pro 12, being c £1.7m for the Welsh and Irish clubs and £2.5m for the Scots and Italian ones. (The difference being that the former were fielding 4 teams in Europe and the latter 2, which seemed slightly odd thinking). Which means that everyone competing in the Cup, whether Challenge or Champions, gets some dosh. I would think it is a lot more for the Champs than the Challs but it may be evenly split, I don't think we've ever been told.

There is apparently more dosh for the winners and runners-up, but no idea how much. Ditto the league, the Weegies got a 6-figure sum IIRC for winning the league a few seasons back.
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Re: Edinburgh Rugby Squad 2018/19

Postby New Gunner on Mon Mar 19, 2018 9:41 pm

royc wrote:Indeedie, having checked, the SRU's spend on international and professional rugby has hardly increased over the last 4 years, viz:

2013/14: £23.614m
2014/15: £22.761m
2015/16: £23.998m
2016/17: £24.967m

That's an increase of 5.7% over 4 years, or average 1.4% a year, which is not even keeping pace with inflation.

As the number of Pro and international players and staff has hardly changed, nor the number of international and pro games, it points to the Pro teams being kept on a very tight financial leash and having, in real terms, less to spend on players than 4 years ago (and probably 5 years, when we see this year's accounts).

I take no pleasure in likely being on the money about the team being on a frozen budget. Not sure the SRU has got its budget priorities right here. Investing in an Aviva team etc may be a grand idea, but surely getting competitive domestic Pro rugby squads capable of challenging for league and Cup silverware (= wonga) should be a high priority?


Is the point not that with an Aviva team, the 'budget' you have to cover is only that team's shortfall on income & expenditure? An existing Prem team like Newcastle has a stadium, significantly more TV / gate / sponsor / hospitality revenue than eg Edinburgh, so the SRU would have to contribute less overall? Admittedly I haven't examined their accounts in detail, just a thought.

Interesting regarding the SRU spend figures above. So it's accepted that, with better commercialisation of the international games (higher attendances, match day revenue, TV money etc) and ever-increasing sponsorship revenue such as BT, the SRU's income is on the rise. So where is the extra money going? Are they paying down the debt with the difference?
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Re: Edinburgh Rugby Squad 2018/19

Postby Friday Knight Lights on Mon Mar 19, 2018 10:02 pm

They'll be paying the debt, increasing investment in junior rugby, coaching structures, the academies and women's rugby grows year on year. The Lille/Nice deal, the Myreside deal, the increased costs running a successful organisation all factor in too.

Perhaps even some rainy day savings for the investment in an Aviva club or third pro team.
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Re: Edinburgh Rugby Squad 2018/19

Postby royc on Mon Mar 19, 2018 10:22 pm

New Gunner wrote:?

Is the point not that with an Aviva team, the 'budget' you have to cover is only that team's shortfall on income & expenditure? An existing Prem team like Newcastle has a stadium, significantly more TV / gate / sponsor / hospitality revenue than eg Edinburgh, so the SRU would have to contribute less overall? Admittedly I haven't examined their accounts in detail, just a thought
.

I'm sure there are some good reasons to invest in a club like Newcastle. As I understand it, they need some finance to enlarge one of their stands or something and the SRU could be a fairy godmother and help hem out, getting a bit of a toe-hold in the Aviva. I can't see how that would rate higher on the list of priorities than giving Cockerill and Rennie a sporting chance of building teams that can compete at the top-end. Half of a million or two going to an Aviva club would make a tremendous difference to both Pro teams' squads and recruitment and especially Edinburgh's.

[/quote=]Interesting regarding the SRU spend figures above. So it's accepted that, with better commercialisation of the international games (higher attendances, match day revenue, TV money etc) and ever-increasing sponsorship revenue such as BT, the SRU's income is on the rise. So where is the extra money going? Are they paying down the debt with the difference?[/quote]

They are paying down the debt gradually, it was down to £5m last year and should be closer to £4m this year, which cuts the interest on the loan commensurately and makes more money available to the game. Maybe £500-£750k will go on that, but that is a small part of the additional money available.

It seems to be earmarked for an Aviva team, the Super Six in due course, more money for the clubs, St Nicois, Mini Murrayfield and whatever else heaven knows! The growing investment in the ladies team, which has proved very fruitful, will obviously be pressing the Performance budget too.

It may be that the SRU has capped the money for international & Pro teams at 'not to exceed 50% of budget', which would pretty much tie in with the figures. It would appeal to the club reps on the SRC too, some at least of whom think the money should be going primarliy to the clubs.

I still view it as a bit of a strategic over-stretch, trying to do too many things at once and jeopardising the Pro teams' chances of achieving much. The main money tree for the SRU is the international game and above all the 6N. With only two Pro teams to draw on for the bulk of the national side, you'd think that making them ultra-competitive - a key component of which is squad budgets - would be well up the priorities list.
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Re: Edinburgh Rugby Squad 2018/19

Postby joe soap on Mon Mar 19, 2018 11:18 pm

royc wrote:Look, it was [the CEO himself who gave the figure of £4-5m for the Pro team squad budgets, I didn't dream it up.
.


for the LawrenceBryce 99th time, ball park in the context of comparing to super 6 budgets of a quarter of the pro teams. He quoted a rough range, the hard numbers are in the Annual Reports to the AGM.

I am making up no numbers, you suggested cuts on no evidence. Even your own AGM quoted extracts show an increase on the DoR's spending. Edinburgh may or may not be ok, what I have said is that the SRU income has risen year on year (fact) and hopefully Edinburgh would be ok.
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Re: Edinburgh Rugby Squad 2018/19

Postby joe soap on Mon Mar 19, 2018 11:22 pm

dolf_lundgren wrote:Another issue is only having 2 home games this season in the 6n, could be a hit of a coupe of million to the overall income. Not sure how the cash is being split in the autumn for the trip to Wales, which seems only to be for the benefit of the coffers. It will by the way have a knock on effect on Edin & Glas as we are likely to have to miss out on players again in the league for that game.


I think the prices went up again this season, pretty certain season pass did.

Only 2 home 6N usually hits us, but we filled Murrayfield for 3 AIs to compensate. Lots of cheap kids tickets but still way higher than the usual income from the 3rd AI at Pittodrie or whatever.
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Re: Edinburgh Rugby Squad 2018/19

Postby New Gunner on Mon Mar 19, 2018 11:27 pm

Had a dig into the annual reports. Some interesting observations:

Over 4 years:

Ticket income +34%
Overall income +31% (+£12m)

Expenditure:
International & professional rugby +20% (+£4m)
Domestic & performance rugby +62% (+£2.9m)
Club support & development +43% (+£0.8m)
Commercial & operational +40% (+£3.6m) - presumably some of this is related to higher matchday + retail revenue
Employment costs +20% (+£4.1m) - all staff costs, not just players / coaches
Net interest -62% (-£0.57m)

Professional players (numbers) +11% (99 v 89) - was 105 in RWC year
EDP / Academy players & coaches +20% (30 v 25)
All playing, coaching, outreach, S&C, physio staff - +18% (274 v 233)
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Re: Edinburgh Rugby Squad 2018/19

Postby doedin on Tue Mar 20, 2018 9:27 am

From the figures being quoted - cheers New Gunner - it looks like the SRU has finally got its act together and is doing a lot of good things. Getting the debt down whilst growing the business and expanding the investment in amateur, youth, ladies, etc is pretty good achievement. I am happy to see the SRU trying to grow the game across all sectors of the game, it has a social and moral responsibility to do so and I have no problem if they push more resource this way. It looks like they have got the balance right?

The set up at Internationals now is just so much more professional then even a few years ago. Someone has suddenly realised that filling the stadium and creating a great atmosphere is good for income. The Weegies are pulling in a good crowd and income every game and e just need to get the Embra stadium issue sorted out for the longer term.

The additional revenue from Embra getting into the big boys cup is a big must for the us and the SRU. It would be a real bonus and I am presuming a year or two ahead of schedule. I am convinced that was why Townsend released a number of players from his squad to try and bolster us against Munster. It was a calculated gamble but worth it. Just having Berghan come on in the 2nd half was enough to turn the tie our way.
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