URC CEO MARTIN Anayi has underlined the competition’s desire to bring games to the US in the near future, particularly matches involving the Irish provinces.

The URC has consistently been linked with expansion into the US and Anayi, speaking on The 42 Rugby Weekly Extra podcast, said that he would like to see league games played in the States sooner rather than later.

“We’ve got to keep looking outwards,” said Anayi. “Look how good the NFL was the other day in Dublin. There’s a synergy between the US and Ireland that, I think I can say, no other pair of countries in the world have.

“We’d be mad not to look at that in the future as a competition that was born, in part at least, in Ireland as the Celtic League.

“With the future and 2031 [when the US hosts the World Cup], we’ve got to look at how we make an impact in the US and grow rugby in the US. What’s the URC’s role in that? I think it can be quite impactful.”

Munster, who hold an annual fundraising dinner in New York, have expressed an interest in playing in the US, while it’s believed that the other Irish provinces would also be keen on further exploring the possibility.

Anayi and the URC would love to see a big Irish inter-provincial game taking place on US soil, but he admitted that the difficulty will be in one team giving up a home fixture.

Home inter-pros are important earners for the provinces. Last season, Leinster made more than €1 million by selling out Croke Park for their home URC game against Munster.

That reality will prove hard to overcome, but Anayi and the URC are fully behind the provinces taking the leap by going to the States.

“We’d support it,” he said. “It’s always about which game?

“The games that they [the US] want are the hardest games to give. When you speak about fandom, when you buy a season ticket, you want to see Leinster v Munster at Croke Park, as it’s going to be again soon. You probably don’t want to see that in New York… or maybe you do.”

With the Welsh Rugby Union soon to confirm its decision around the number of professional franchises it will continue with from next season, there could be change on the way for the URC and its make-up.

Anayi addressed that matter on The 42 Rugby Weekly Extra, discussing possible options for the URC if Wales drops one or two of its current four teams. He spoke about links to a Georgian team and London Irish.

There has also been some suggestion that US franchises could be integrated into the URC. Whether or not that is a prospect in the future, Anayi believes that the URC should be bringing games to the States.

“I think we should be doing that either way and if that leads to the next step [of creating franchises], so be it. But I think that’s what we should be doing. We should be growing that.

“We have a new partnership with FloSports [the broadcaster and streaming service] in the US and it’s one our our most valuable contracts. You can see that there is an audience for rugby and for Celtic rugby, but also South African rugby. We’re seeing there’s a big South African diaspora in various parts of the US too.

“There’s certainly something from a market point of view that we think has already borne fruit from that media perspective, so that should be an indication that there’s a fandom there. That’s something to work on this year.” 

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