IRFU CEO KEVIN Potts has confirmed that the union is currently undertaking a review into Ireland’s World Cup campaign in the wake of a narrow quarter-final exit for Andy Farrell’s side at the hands of New Zealand last month.
The union always carries out reviews into Ireland’s World Cup campaigns, with IRFU performance director David Nucifora again leading this investigation of what Ireland did well and what they could have done better.
Nucifora is set to reveal the findings next month.
“There is a review underway,” said Potts today.
“In fact, it started before the end of the tournament. You collect data from people when they are in camp and David will go into this in much greater detail when he does his briefing in December.”
Potts was speaking as the IRFU confirmed a deficit of just under €1 million for the 2022/23 accounting period, which was considerably less than the €7.4 million loss the union had forecast for the year.
The main reason for the better-than-expected financial outcome was the Grand Slam success enjoyed by Farrell’s side, as well as a new sponsor for the 2022 November Tests, and revenues from the sale of long-term tickets for the Aviva Stadium.
However, Potts revealed that the IRFU’s deficit for 2023/24 is likely to be well in excess of €10 million on account of the significant cost of the 2023 World Cup campaign.
“This World Cup has cost the IRFU in the region of €10 million and this is for two reasons,” said Potts.
“One, the loss of our regular November international matches [in 2023], which is not fully offset in any way by the summer warm-up games.
Two, the significant additional costs of preparing our team and participating in the tournament that aren’t covered fully by World Rugby. These include additional training camps, additional preparation camps, additional support staff around the team, additional logistics, player costs, and additional hotel costs.”
Potts confirmed that this was Ireland’s most expensive World Cup campaign ever and explained that a fee of around €5 million the IRFU received from World Rugby for being at the World Cup had helped to offset what was a total cost of around €15 million.
“It is,” he said. “With this team, it was important that whatever was required to enable them to be at their best for this tournament, no stone was going to be left unturned. Everybody in Irish rugby would expect that and that investment has been made.
“It is the highest cost. The loss of the November games is massive. It comes up to a significant number alone.
“We do get money from World Rugby, around €5m this year, and that’s netted off against that. So that €10m is netted against the €5m that we get from World Rugby.
“So, yes is the answer. I guess, if we want to be going to World Cups and aspiring to win, which we should, that cost is unlikely to come down. But perhaps the model with World Rugby and the funds coming back to participating unions may increase. We’re not the only union facing that hit.”
Potts said the IRFU expects to return to “close to break-even” in 2024/25 and stated that “at no stage in the next 10 years are we forecasting that the IRFU will go into debt.”
It helps hugely that the IRFU still has net assets of €106 million and cash reserves of €63 million. Potts, however, said he will continue to urge Irish rugby to live within its means.
Financially, a big moment looms for the IRFU and other top unions in 2026 when the next broadcast deal for the Six Nations and new Nations Cup is due to begin. With that new competition kicking off, the unions are expecting a notable increase in TV money.
“The broadcast values that are obtained at that time are really important,” said Potts. “We’re all working together very well on that, but that is vital. If we don’t get uplifts at that time, we will have to start cutting some of our programmes. We’re not expecting to have to do that, we’re hopeful and optimistic about that.”
Potts said it is “not necessarily” the case that Ireland’s biggest games could be taken off free-to-air TV in that new deal, adding that even while unions look to balance maximum exposure and maximum revenues, it is pleasing that URC, Champions Cup, and Ireland games are currently all shown on free-to-air TV.
“It’s too early to speculate,” said Potts of the future, “but to date it’s all been free-to-air in the Six Nations.”
The ongoing success of the Ireland men’s 15s national team is pivotal to sustaining all of Irish rugby, as the accounts for 2022/23 demonstrated, with prize money helping on top of Farrell’s side drawing full houses to the Aviva Stadium.
Potts confirmed that the corporate boxes at the Aviva are all sold out but he does not believe that match atmospheres at the Dublin venue have declined because the crowd has become too corporate.
“No, because most of our tickets for the Six Nations go through our clubs,” said Potts.
“In fact, we have approximately 10,000 10-year ticket-holders, but we have approximately 2,000 box seats. We have a commercial programme but it’s low thousands.
“The rest of our tickets are being sold to our clubs. The rest that come back from our clubs then go on to our supporters’ club. As long as that’s the case, we would expect that the majority of the people in the stadium should be club people.
“I don’t think the atmosphere out there is too corporate, we obviously need corporate. We’ve great sponsors and they play a big role in funding our game.
“I’ve been coming to Lansdowne Road or the Aviva Stadium a long time and on the days when our team is performing or playing those big teams, it still buzzes.”
