Saracens are having a vintage year and making rugby history, but for all the wrong reasons.
A lot of unconfirmed hype has been flying around the European rugby circles that Saracens has now become the most indebted club in rugby history.
According to the Daily Mail, the club now has a estimated debt of a staggering £45.1m. (A$91m). This makes the ARU’s financial position look quite manageable.
They report further that Saracens’ club chairman, Nigel Wray, admitted – tongue in cheek – that the club could make cuts to the playing roster to save money, and finish 11th, but he was not willing to jeopardise the club’s playing ambitions nor to affect the Saracens’ brand.
Wray doesn’t make any bones about it in his Chairman’s Statement in the club’s last annual accounts; he complained:
Fair enough – but let the rules be changed first Mr. Wray.
Mako Vunipola in Rugby World Cup – how much are Saracens paying to keep him?
Saracens are currently sitting on top of the English Premiership and qualified for the European Rugby Champions Cup, ranked first. Overall they have won 14 of their 15 games this season.
But their results may be tainted according to some observers who think they are carrying players who should be too expensive. They can point out that Saracens spent £9.81m (A$20m) in wages last season even though the salary cap in the English Premiership is just £5.1m.
Other teams would like to have the likes of Owen Farrell, Brad Barritt, Schalk Brits, Chris Ashton, Marcelo Bosch and the Vunipola brothers, but how much is Sarries paying to retain them?
It was also reported last December that Saracens made a play to scrap the salary cap completely but failed to gain any support from the other premiership clubs. But these same clubs don’t seen to be complaining enough to the RFU about Saracens.
If Saracens keep rolling them because of dodgy salary cap practices, if that is the case, it will their own damn fault.
Nigel Wray – winners are grinners
Or, if they have complained, the silence of the RFU (which does not report on such matters unless there is a breach), means that no case has been proven against Saracens, and this will fuel speculation that a secret settlement was made.
So what happens next you ask?
This Saracens’ team will likely go on to win the English/European double if Toulon cannot find a way to stop them. They will continue to spend and recruit world class players, Aussies included, to dominate every club competition they can.
For the first time ever, no Pro 12 team has qualified for the European Rugby Champions Cup quarter-finals. Yes, they would tell you, they have let themselves down and not played the best rugby, but it was an uneven playing field for them.
If other clubs follow the Saracens’ path, the English Premiership will stuff up England rugby nationally as the Top 14 has for France—and the Aussie exodus will quicken.
The power of privately owned money-backed clubs will be felt all around the world.
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