Aviva Premiership: something exciting happens

[riocard911]

https://www.bbc.com/sport/rugby-union/63987707

Baxter moaning about travel costs to South Africa. It's one game for 2 or 3 English clubs per year. And the Heineken Cup are paying a big chunk of their expenses anyway.

14th Jan is pretty much the cheapest time of the year to fly.

Would it kill them to say they were excited about a massive opportunity for them, rather than try to kill it.

The Prem's financial woes are for the most part self-inflicted, so spare us the béal bocht there, Rob. Hope the Chiefs get their desired "bumper sell-out" and then stuffed by the Bulls!!! (Which, should it come to pass, will probably lead to another round of moaning...)

[ronk]

I'm only realising now that because the Prem teams don't have a say over what counties are in the URC that they may never have been asked about the SA teams.

It's a no brainer that they'd want to play them, even with travel hassles. They might not be such big fans of a more viable URC and the increased competition for SA players.

At the risk of being seen of hypocrites, I suppose we have only travelled there once so far and we sent a skeleton team that was controversial at the time too.

The new format of the Heineken Cup group stage means we can't travel to SA.

[Dave Cahill]

New ownership of Wasps has been approved by the RFU which means they can take their place in the Championship next season. The RFU has not approved the new ownership of Worcester Warriors for reasons including funding and the lodgement of a bond, and have urged the administrators to revisit the sale of ownership process. Steve Diamond's consortium, which was passed over by the Warriors' administrators in favour of an American-led consortium, remains interested.

[tigerburnie]

New ownership of Wasps has been approved by the RFU which means they can take their place in the Championship next season. The RFU has not approved the new ownership of Worcester Warriors for reasons including funding and the lodgement of a bond, and have urged the administrators to revisit the sale of ownership process. Steve Diamond's consortium, which was passed over by the Warriors' administrators in favour of an American-led consortium, remains interested.

Reading some of the Wuss supporters comments, it seems the rejected consortium were only after the land and not interested in the rugby, hopefully Diamond can come up trumps, at least he is a rugby man.

[the spoofer]

Finn Russell getting £1m a season with Bath. How can the poor Premiership teams compete with moneybags Leinster? You’d be as well off setting fire to it.

[FLIP]

Finn Russell getting £1m a season with Bath. How can the poor Premiership teams compete with moneybags Leinster? You’d be as well off setting fire to it.

Nothing says rebuilding your team known for being mercurial at best Powerpuff at worse than buying a fly half known for being mercurial at best Powerpuff at worse, from another team known for being mercurial at best Powerpuff at worse.

[wixfjord]

According to TRK, 'Russell is 100% a JVG player'.

https://twitter.com/threeredkings/statu ... 4517600260

Did you ever hear such nonsense?

I assume he means in terms of winning very little and not being able to get teams over the line in big matches.

[wixfjord]

Not surprised Racing aren't breaking the bank to keep Russell. If Lancaster has anything to do with it he'll be out the door.

[the spoofer]

Not surprised Racing aren't breaking the bank to keep Russell. If Lancaster has anything to do with it he'll be out the door.

I cannot believe that a team is paying £1m for Russell. Xan, if you read this, would you have any stats on how often Russell has played Leinster/Ireland and how many of those he has won? I'd imagine it's a tiny percentage.

[Flash Gordon]

Finn Russell getting £1m a season with Bath. How can the poor Premiership teams compete with moneybags Leinster? You’d be as well off setting fire to it.

Highest paid Bath player was on £275k I think and they turned over £11.5million last year - they lost 2million in 2020. Spending a million quid on one player with these financials is absolute madness. You've got to question how the league is allowing their clubs to financially self destruct like this particularly given how their league is falling apart due to unsustainable financials.

[the spoofer]

Finn Russell getting £1m a season with Bath. How can the poor Premiership teams compete with moneybags Leinster? You’d be as well off setting fire to it.

Highest paid Bath player was on £275k I think and they turned over £11.5million last year - they lost 2million in 2020. Spending a million quid on one player with these financials is absolute madness. You've got to question how the league is allowing their clubs to financially self destruct like this particularly given how their league is falling apart due to unsustainable financials.

I could understand it if it was for a player who would drive success and improve culture (Sexton) but for a piss up flake? no thanks.

[ronk]

Finn Russell getting £1m a season with Bath. How can the poor Premiership teams compete with moneybags Leinster? You’d be as well off setting fire to it.

Highest paid Bath player was on £275k I think and they turned over £11.5million last year - they lost 2million in 2020. Spending a million quid on one player with these financials is absolute madness. You've got to question how the league is allowing their clubs to financially self destruct like this particularly given how their league is falling apart due to unsustainable financials.

Bath are owned by this guy: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Craig
He can afford to gamble a mil or two. Russell probably won't win them anything but he might make some of it back in tickets, commercials and prize money. All moot with JvG anyway.

It's not how I would spend that kind of money but it might be a headline figure for puffery.

[riocard911]

Shoddy, lazy use of language in a PA article reproduced in yesterday's the42.

"Bath said that he will join them after next year’s World Cup, ending a successful spell with French Top 14 club Racing 92."

"Successful"? Pull the other one; it's got bells on.....

[Flash Gordon]

Finn Russell getting £1m a season with Bath. How can the poor Premiership teams compete with moneybags Leinster? You’d be as well off setting fire to it.

Highest paid Bath player was on £275k I think and they turned over £11.5million last year - they lost 2million in 2020. Spending a million quid on one player with these financials is absolute madness. You've got to question how the league is allowing their clubs to financially self destruct like this particularly given how their league is falling apart due to unsustainable financials.

Bath are owned by this guy: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Craig
He can afford to gamble a mil or two. Russell probably won't win them anything but he might make some of it back in tickets, commercials and prize money. All moot with JvG anyway.

It's not how I would spend that kind of money but it might be a headline figure for puffery.

And of course there's a salary cap of 5 million, so Russell would get 20% of the entire wage bill. Or if you look at the average salary of a top player in a club, you'll have to clear 6 of them to make room. It's utter madness. Bath is pretty much sold out on tickets anyway so there's no incremental revenue there and if your squad is being decimated to make room for his wages are you going to increase your prize money?

[cormac]

Highest paid Bath player was on £275k I think and they turned over £11.5million last year - they lost 2million in 2020. Spending a million quid on one player with these financials is absolute madness. You've got to question how the league is allowing their clubs to financially self destruct like this particularly given how their league is falling apart due to unsustainable financials.

Bath are owned by this guy: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Craig
He can afford to gamble a mil or two. Russell probably won't win them anything but he might make some of it back in tickets, commercials and prize money. All moot with JvG anyway.

It's not how I would spend that kind of money but it might be a headline figure for puffery.

And of course there's a salary cap of 5 million, so Russell would get 20% of the entire wage bill. Or if you look at the average salary of a top player in a club, you'll have to clear 6 of them to make room. It's utter madness. Bath is pretty much sold out on tickets anyway so there's no incremental revenue there and if your squad is being decimated to make room for his wages are you going to increase your prize money?

They’re allowed one player outside the cap. Russell would be that player.

[ronk]

And it's designed that way so that clubs can sign marquee superstars for silly money.

[riocard911]

Can't imagine such a wage differential coupled with Russell's flakiness will be good for squad morale. Quite the opposite, in fact.

[Laighin Break]

Harlequins - Bristol match yesterday was referreed by Karl Dickson, a former Quins player. So it's not just the URC!

[Xanthippe]

Harlequins - Bristol match yesterday was referreed by Karl Dickson, a former Quins player. So it's not just the URC!

Interesting - so the former Quins player is standing almost directly beside Joe Marler when he says something (allegedly about Heenan’s mother) which was bad enough to get an immediate reaction from Jake Heenan and Yann Thomas but he did nothing about it!!!

[sunshiner1]

by Xanthippe

Interesting - so the former Quins player is standing almost directly beside Joe Marler when he says something (allegedly about Heenan’s mother) which was bad enough to get an immediate reaction from Jake Heenan and Yann Thomas but he did nothing about it!!!

Yep. Jake Heenan's mom is in hospital which is why he took it personal. Scumbag behaviour from Marler.