The Celtic nations and Italy will meet the Rugby Football Union next week ready to make concessions to ensure that European club rugby continues next season after the English and French sides pull out of the Heineken Cup.
The RFU chief executive, Ian Ritchie, has been in regular contact with Premiership Rugby and is keen to help broker an agreement that will satisfy both clubs and unions. That would mean the end of European Rugby Cup, which has organised the Heineken Cup since its inception in 1995.
The meeting is an acknowledgement that the two-day summit called by ERC on 23 October in Dublin will be a futile exercise, with the English and French clubs saying they will not be attending. The four RaboDirect unions – Wales, Ireland, Scotland and Italy – are ready to make concessions on two key issues: a meritocratic qualification process and an equal division of money between the three leagues that feed into the Heineken and Amlin Challenge Cups, and they are ready to talk about control.
Premiership Rugby and Ligue Nationale de Rugby announced last month that they were setting up the two-tiered Rugby Champions Cup from next season and invited the Rabo teams to join them, an approach that was rejected on their behalf by the unions.
The unions then hoped that this month’s ERC summit would lead to a solution. ERC organised it after arranging for an independent mediator, Graeme Mew, to examine why a new participation accord had not been agreed and to find a way of bringing the unions and clubs back to the negotiating table, but the French and the English are not interested in remaining in ERC.
The Celtic unions and Italy would take a significant financial hit if there were no European club tournament next season, unlike their French and English counterparts, who do not rely on it to finance their professional sides.
The unions are willing to talk, although International Rugby Board regulations mean they have to use the RFU and French Rugby Federation as conduits, before the clubs have fleshed out their tournament skeleton.
The English and French clubs want money from the tournament to be split between three leagues, but the European tournament would need to boost its turnover from the current £44m to £70m for the 12 Rabo sides to remain where they are now financially.
The Welsh regions are anxious for a settlement with key players coming out of contract, including Leigh Halfpenny, Sam Warburton, Alun Wyn Jones, Adam Jones and Jonathan Davies. They are refusing to sign a new participation agreement with their union until they know what next season will look like and they are using their influence with Premiership Rugby to push for the financial pie to be divided by teams rather than leagues.
© Guardian News & Media Limited 2013
