The saga of Manu, the five (or 6) and their contracts may or may not end up being one of the more memorable moments in Leicester Tigers history, but it may have revealed much more about how life within Welford Road exists.
The focus will obviously be on Tuilagi, the England and Lions centre and where he will end up, bar a now extraordinary turnaround for him and perhaps Jordan Taufua.
There is a lot we don’t know and probably will never know, in reality, but this week should open minds to what the reality of professional sport is like when it comes to contracts. Owners often want to pay as little as possible (especially up front), players want security, long-term deals and to play with their mates and have a laugh. Oh, and everybody wants as much cash as possible.
I’m wary of isolating the five or six who have refused to sign revised contracts because in their and others’ minds, they’re not rebels. Their unhappiness is shared among players who took a more politically convenient stance. While it is right to laud 60% of Tigers’ season ticket holders who have in effect donated to the club in times and we understand when those who can’t, don’t, the same latitude isnt given to players.
Ah I hear you cry, but these are unique times. We’re all struggling and the players are on big money. They should cough up and compromise. Imagine what it’s like for the rest of us.
But compromise depends on trust and you cannot fail to mistake its absence around these parts.
The board hate the leaking to people like me (trade secret — clubs sometimes do it too) and when you’ve been 11th last season, are there again this time around, the desire to get back on track must be immense — especially when there’s 10 title trophies in the backroom.
Imagine the constant drip, drip, drip of stories about poor results, then the pandemic shuts everything away and now you’ve looking down the financial barrel. When you’ve finished second from bottom, you’ll be fed up with fans, contacts (and especially the bloody media…) all asking what’s going on if they’re not calling for your head outright.
Running a professional sports club will never provide a quiet life.
Anyone who has come across Peter Tom knows that even in his 80th year, he marches to the sound of gunfire in the Jo Grimond phrase. You cross him only when you have a good pension, life insurance and preferably both. I mean that as a compliment. Private Godfrey never ran a £20-odd million turnover business.
Only he and a few colleagues — which may be half the problem — know exactly what Leicester’s financial position truly is. No one thinks for a second that it’s positive.
£5 million in revenue has been reportedly lost, say the club and there is no major matchday revenue coming in any time soon. Central funds from PRL still come in (thanks BT) but there is unlikely to be big money from the RFU/clubs deal. The CVC receipts appear to have been spent largely on reducing debts, which are not thought to be a significant long-term issue.
But costs are being saved. A 25% salary cut saves at least £3 million a year, maybe more if Tuilagi, Veaniu and Taufua leave without taking legal action. 31 redundancies have also been made.
Some money is surfacing with those season ticket holders donating their hard-earned cash with no guarantee of seeing any rugby soon.
Leicester are therefore cutting costs ruthlessly. In these circumstances, cash is king. Cashflow is everything. The less you spend, the more flexibility you have to deal with current and future events.
But stripping costs out of the business is also something you do if you want to sell the club at some future point. While not one person who would know has suggested to me that Tigers are about to go belly-up, you do wonder if those future options are occupying minds as much as the current situation.
No doubt Leicester are suffering issues but Paul Rees in the Guardian probably hit on the reason why the Tigers’ negotiations have consistently hit the media. While other clubs appear to collaborate, the evidence is that Tigers dictate.
Players will always be vulnerable to being labelled as greedy and some no doubt are. Others are not. This playing squad is no different. But most — especially those without international callups — say they wanted to work collaboratively and an opportunity has been missed, though two other clubs, Gloucester and London Irish appear to be having similar issues.
There are two questions which appear to have been overlooked in the hue and cry and genuinely, they shouldn’t be.
1. Greg Bateman is popular in the dressing room and with supporters — and until recently, hosting his own podcast in the burgeoning Welford Road in-house media output. But he was also RPA rep and did that play a part in his future at Leicester being curtailed?
2. This all revolves around breach of contract in a time of wage cuts, so let’s get to brass tacks. It would seem as if wages have already been deducted, so did the club ask for consent beforehand and was it given?
What does consent mean? According to legal specialists, consent must be “clear and unequivocal” and in writing. Whether it’s deferment or permanent cuts, consent must be given.
An RPA statement issued on June 10th claimed that temporary cuts were unilaterally imposed across the Premiership. I am aware of a number of Leicester players — not all within the hold-outs — who claim this happened to them.
Prima facie, regardless of how the club intended to restore those payments, that is breach of contract if it is true. Did Leicester players give consent?
If they did, the players are playing silly buggers.
If they didn’t, ask yourself how you would react if your employer unilaterally deducted 25% of your salary.
But why are Leicester are in the headlines? What about everybody else? Frankly, who cares about London Irish (sadly)? Gloucester don’t have as many England players at the moment.
At Leicester, trust has ebbed away for some time. You have agents pushing for the extra 5% their client must receive because it will stop Toulouse nipping in and pinching him — whether they are or not. Then at the last moment, they sign to stay.
While it’s now not always the case, the culture of the one-club player is still intrinsic to rugby. To leave in a huff is still not acceptable.
Specifically, at Leicester, that “hire em, fire em” culture is bound to hammer away at the players’ sense that their future is secure. The squad churn at Leicester since their last title in 2013 is well documented — an Italian phase of recruitment took shape one summer, then there was a Newcastle phase and others. Ship in half a dozen, move half a dozen on — to save a few thousand pounds here and there, while you stay under the cap.
That might have been done in the absence of an Academy brimming with talent. Not so now. But as is now realised, you also quickly lose the core of your club if you’re not careful, as well as the loyalty of the players who come up through the system.
In 2017, this saw its peak when after Matt O’Connor’s arrival at the club, a raft of changes to personnel were made. Big names came in including George Ford and Jonny May, but to facilitate their arrival, a number of others were forced to leave mid-contract — Freddie Burns, Ed Slater, Lachlan McCaffrey, Peter Betham, JP Pietersen and others — and most of them unwillingly.
I wonder if the seeds of 2020’s discord were sown in the summer three years ago. For all the disruption, all bar two of the signings to arrive in 2017 are no longer at Leicester. Three more summers followed — 16 left in 2018 and over 20 in both 2019 and this year. Way more than Exeter or Saracens.
Memories of the way Leicester have operated in recent years may still be fresh. Employment at Welford Road was less a sinecure and more a change of platform to their ultimate destination.
But should we really be surprised? Are Leicester massively that different from any other club? Probably not.
As owners, if you’re desperate to improve things, the first and quickest way you can affect a situation is change players. Not change the system of play, the culture of the club — those intangibles take a lot longer.
Sometimes it works and the hopes of the county of Leicestershire rest on Steve Borthwick doing just that. But sometimes moving players in and out is all you can do. Welcome to professional sport.
For those who having a pop at the media for negativity, get real. Believe who you want to believe but there are plenty of reasons why most on both sides of this would like you see their way of thinking. Bar one exception, I’ve met very few who do.
