The IRFU has reported a deficit of €10 million in the year to the end of July 2021.

It has clearly been the most challenging ever financial period, though the damage to the balance sheet has been lessened from the 2020 hit by virtue of €18.2 million in government assistance across a number of programmes, and receipt of 13.2 million from the CVC buying into PRO-14 Rugby to create the United Rugby Championship.

They were two significant additional streams to add to the overall revenue picture which increased from €76.8 million in the previous year to €81.0 million this year.

The main hit from Covid, in financial terms, was to the revenue from representative matches which dropped from €84.2 million in the last full year before Covid, to €73.7 million in 2020 and €59.0 million in 2021.

Providing support to the four provinces was a key part in keeping the game afloat and saw a rise in the central cost of running the professional game from €48.3 million to €68.1 million.

In total that included funding of €27 million to the provinces and €4 million to clubs, the purpose of which was to keep the elements of the sport solvent and that has been achieved. The return of fans to stadia, the new broadcast deals around international and provincial rugby and extended commercial partnerships with Guinness and Vodafone all add to the light becoming ever brighter at the end of the Covid tunnel.

“The extraordinary circumstances created by the COVID-19 virus and its variants continue to dictate how society can behave and sport is no exception in terms of the impact of government restrictions,” said outgoing CEO Philip Browne in his extensive narrative on the year.

“The IRFU has carefully followed all government guidelines and has worked closely with Sport Ireland and the Governments to plan for the graduated return of participants to rugby at grassroots level and also in terms of the graduated return of spectators to club, provincial and international matches.”

“Whilst all the planning is in place for a gradual return to normality it is all contingent on the COVID situation and on the rollout of what appears to be a very effective national vaccination programme.”

Getting back to an even keel has not been without a degree of pain at every level. The financial review conducted across the entire sport at the end of last year gave rise to what Browne describes as “an immediate and permanent 10 per cent reduction in the cost base of the Union.

In human terms, staff worked at 20 per cent less of a salary in the first six months of the financial year and ten per cent less to July. Nineteen positions had to be lost through redundancy, adding to the loss of resources at the game’s disposal in the recovery.

On the commercial side, VW moved on from its position as official vehicle partner but was replaced immediately by Opel on a three-year deal which is a credit to the team in the challenging circumstances that face the auto sector.

Vodafone, Guinness, Canterbury, Energia and Aviva all come in for special mention alongside the long list of sponsors who have stuck by the sport including Aer Lingus, PwC, Aldi, Blackrock Export Services, Aon, Lucozade Sport, Dove Men+Care, Specsavers, Eden Park, DHL Express, Gilbert Philip Lee and others.

Getting through the worst of Covid and the associated closing of society has been a mammoth task for all sporting organisations.

Rugby faced perhaps the toughest challenge with the high cost of running the professional game and the higher than other dependence on the matchday income that was taken away.

That it has done so will perhaps go down as one of its greatest achievements and while the financial reserves it had built up have fallen from €96 million in 2020 to €59 million in 2021, they are within 20 per cent of the €68 million level they were at in 2019.

There is obviously a long way to regain full financial health but wins for both the Women’s and the Men’s teams over the weekend, and the continued strength of the provinces at United Rugby Championship and Heineken Cup level give hope that it is a journey which will be completed.

 

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