This weekend’s two major Club Rugby finals have a symmetry in their being played between French and English clubs and news breaking yesterday of a massive TV deal signed by French Rugby means the gap in resources that deliver winning teams is not going to diminish in the near future.
The new deal between League National du Rugby and Canal+ will come into effect from 2019 and will see the annual return to the clubs climbing to just short of €100 million.
To put this in context it is more than twice what the English Premiership clubs receive for their broadcast rights from BT Sport and seven times the yield from the Guinness Pro12 contracts with Sky, BT Sport and regional broadcasters including TG4 in the Irish market.
That is a massive difference which can only see the attraction of France for players becoming ever more so.
Dan Carter became the sports highest paid player when moving to Racing Metro after last year’s Rugby World Cup and the reward is a place in the Champions’ Cup Final.
Ronan O’Gara, pictured above with Carter, is part of the coaching set up in Paris and has committed his short term future to the club, until at least 2019.
Paul O’Connell had chosen to go in a similar direction until injury robbed him of the final pay day in the sun.
The disparity is now so great that it will be of major concern to those hoping for a return to the glory days of when Irish provinces dominated the club scene.
Players and agents looking at the short window in which to secure a financial future will be casting more than a glance at how this new wave of money impacts on the structures of club rugby and whether as in soccer there is likely to be a similar significant transfer of wealth to the players.
