The Premiership final on Saturday is not the ideal one for the organisers. Bath and Saracens, two clubs who have built success on financial losses, are regarded as the beneficiaries of a decision by the top clubs to suspend an investigation into alleged salary cap irregularities.
Saracens, in particular, have been linked with the investigation into suspected breaches of the cap, although Premiership Rugby’s policy is not to comment either way on whether a club’s spending on player wages is being scrutinised until an inquiry has been completed – and then only if the outcome is a guilty verdict.
The Saracens owner, Nigel Wray, has insisted that the club have not broken the cap, while Bath Rugby’s managing director, Tarquin McDonald, also denied any wrongdoing in March, saying: “We are under the cap and we’re going to be under the cap next year. There’s quite a significant step up in terms of the cap next year, around 20% or so, so that allows for the investment in players we’ve seen.”
Related: England’s Stuart Lancaster in World Cup tight spot over hothead Dylan Hartley
The decision to suspend the investigation, taken at a meeting of Premiership Rugby’s shareholders, was made partly to avoid potential embarrassment at a time when negotiations are being held with the Rugby Football Union over the renewal of the elite player agreement. When would be a good time to release bad news? During the World Cup?
The suspension is likely to be indefinite, not least because Saracens have long argued that the salary cap is anti-competitive and breaches European law. The prospect of the affair ending up in court is not one that appeals, even to those who view with disdain the way Saracens lost £6m in the year they last won the title.
The clubs are more concerned with the future than the past, wanting to increase the size of the Premiership from 12 clubs to 14 and suspend relegation for at least four years to allow, so we are told, businesses to grow. Those who have argued for the removal of the salary cap or a substantial increase in it will get their way, while others who have lived in fear of the drop and its consequences for longer than they care to remember would no longer have to field anxious inquiries from bank managers.
So whoever wins on Saturday will not be exposed later in the year if they did breach the salary cap. There is no appetite for what would follow, although it is hypocritical of the clubs to demand that the Stuart Lancaster observes the selection policy for the national side, which excludes players based outside the Premiership except under exceptional circumstances. The England head coach would be entitled to tell them where to get off.
The final should be more open than the meetings about the salary cap and who may have spent what. Bath have reached the final day for the first time since 2004 and are looking to win a title that has eluded them since the first year of professionalism. They will be the neutrals’ choice, having taken attacking play to a new level this season, challenging those who believe defence comes first.
Their midfield triangle of George Ford, Kyle Eastmond and Jonathan Joseph finds space where none appears to exist and will stress the blanket defence of Saracens.
When Ford left Leicester two summers ago the Tigers felt he was moving too soon and needed to continue his apprenticeship under Toby Flood. He knew he was ready to hold down a starting place and his former club did not read the signs, one reason they have failed to reach the final in his absence after nine in a row.
Bath are still on their way up and the final will be the club’s most significant game for some while. Saracens have become used to the big occasion, as they showed in winning at Franklin’s Gardens in the semi-final, a day when they got their planning and execution right. While Bath overran Leicester at The Rec, they have not been so potent on the road.
They won six of their 11 away matches in the Premiership, all against the sides in the bottom half of the table. They secured a mere two bonus points on their travels to Northampton, Leicester, Saracens, Exeter and Wasps – although they won with a flourish at Toulouse in the Champions Cup – and while they have a squad to ensure that the final should not be a one-off, coupled with a dynamic style of play, they will be up against the masters of disaster.
Saracens have not been the model of consistency during the past two years, when they finished at the top of the Premiership but failed to win the title. They have paced themselves more and they way they neutralised Northampton, attacking them at their strongest point and overpowering them, was impressive. Their back row of Jacques Burger, Maro Itoje and Billy Vunipola seemed to cover the entire field, making their presence felt.
It is hard to see Saracens taking on Bath in a running game, even if they are far from one-dimensional: no side with Alex Goode at full-back can be dismissed as predictable, but their rhythm comes through method and an appreciation of the art of the possible. In that sense it has the potential to be a contrast in styles, like the Pro12 final, where Munster share some of Sarries’ qualities and Glasgow are like Bath in their determination to attack.
Much will be made of the duel between Ford and Owen Farrell at fly-half, two friends brought up in the world of rugby league but who very quickly proved themselves in union. A year ago, Farrell was by some way England’s first choice at fly-half yet he now trails Ford to the point where he is more likely to start the World Cup at 12 rather than 10.
Ford has been the player of the season, imperturbable and refined. He has Farrell’s iron core and the vision of a playmaker; knock him down and he gets straight back up. Mistakes do not faze him. Saracens have their wolf pack, Bath have a fox and on Saturday afternoon it does not matter whether the salary cap fits either club. Finals often disappoint – but this should be one to savour.
ITALIAN CLUBS VERSUS THE PRO12
Munster and Glasgow meet in Belfast to battle for Leinster’s crown at the end of a season when Italy’s involvement in the Pro12 is again the subject of speculation – and not only because Treviso and Zebre are struggling financially.
The change in the way the European Cup is organised has driven home to the Celts the difference in commercial pulling power between their league and those in England and France. The Pro12 may have secured Sky as its main broadcaster but the contract is worth a fraction of what the Premiership and Top 14 pull in.
The Pro12 has been run by the unions involved but, after their struggle with their union, the Welsh regions have won the right to conduct the commercial negotiations on behalf of Wales and the Irish provinces are moving in that direction. The unions are unlikely to relinquish control as their English and French counterparts have done but power will be devolved.
The teams involved know that it is their league, rather than Europe, that will determine their purchasing power, which is why, given the choice, they would forge ahead without the Italians. Feelers have been extended to London Scottish and London Welsh about replacing Treviso and Zebre, and while that would not lead to an immediate rise in the standard of the Pro12, it would open a door.
There is a belief among the Celtic sides that moving the headquarters of the Pro12 from Dublin to London would enhance its commercial appeal and help it grow. It already has a major sponsor in Guinness and a leading broadcaster but its value is understated, and so the calls for a hard sell.
It is not a simple matter of expelling Treviso and Zebre and inviting London Scottish and London Welsh to take their place. The Rugby Football Union would have to give its consent, as would World Rugby, which would be concerned at the impact the move would have on rugby in Italy.
Treviso and Zebre would have to return to domestic competition, with France unwilling to adopt them in their league system. That would leave Italy with no one in the Champions Cup, where places are determined by league positions. That could have an effect on Italy’s performance in the Six Nations, although they would become like Argentina, with the vast majority of their squad playing outside the country.
If Italy survive in the Pro12 this time, the presence of their sides will be a recurring theme. Treviso and Zebre finished in the bottom two, again, worn down by constant travelling and rarely making an impression on the road. They are not a draw and they struggle to attract crowds.
The Pro12 will not maximise itself commercially as long as the Italians remain in it and they in effect subsidise Treviso and Zebre, one of the arguments the English and French clubs used in their case for a reformed Europe, although they had the entire Pro12 in mind rather than one quarter of it.
The Celtic and Italian league lives in the shadow of the Premiership. The two finals receive vastly different media coverage and, while none of the top four in the Pro12 reached the knockout stage of the Champions Cup, three of the English clubs did.
Munster were in the same pool as Saracens and Glasgow were in Bath’s group, both winning the respective home matches. At the start of the season, Glasgow’s head coach, Gregor Townsend, said that he would regard the campaign as a failure if it did not end with the Pro12 title, having lost last year’s final.
Like Munster, they only just made it, edging past Ulster, while their opponents were thanking the review system that denied Ospreys a late, winning try. Glasgow squeezed out Munster in last season’s semi-final and it promises to be another close encounter in what may be Paul O’Connell’s final match for Munster.
The crowd for the final will be some 20% of that which the Premiership final attracts at Twickenham, something else the Pro12 will consider as it looks of ways of reducing the financial gap.
THE HARTLEY QUESTION
The start of the World Cup is less than four months away, near yet far. This month England have lost Manu Tuilagi because of an off-the-field incident, Dylan Hartley has had another brush with a disciplinary committee and the Wales and Lions centre Jonathan Davies will be out of action for the rest of the year after suffering knee ligament damage playing for Clermont Auvergne. The best laid plans etc.
There will be more casualties along the way and there will come a time, surely, when those who run the game in France ponder the wisdom of a season that starts on 15 August, after a summer tour with the national side for some, and drags on until the middle of June.
Never mind the idiosyncrasies of the France head coach, Philippe Saint-André, and his immediate predecessors, the system in France is overloaded and the season too long. The Toulon coach, Bernard Laporte, has called for the Top 14 to become the Top 12 – and that would be a place to start: next season’s league play-off final will be played on 25 June, more than 10 months after the start of France’s World Cup warm-up matches.
The money is there for players in France and they have to earn it. Hartley turned down the chance to move there last year to stay with Northampton but one red card and one citing later, the decision may cost him in more ways than one.
Hartley had a quiet few months after being sent off in December for elbowing the Leicester centre Matt Smith. He is at his most effective when he lives on the edge, as he did during last weekend’s play-off semi-final against Saracens, when he led from the front in defeat.
Yet he found himself before a disciplinary panel on Wednesday night after being cited for striking his opposite number Jamie George with his head in a show of aggression that went too far and again raised questions about his value to England, even before the four-week suspension that rules him out of the three warm-ups and the World Cup opener against Fiji.
Hartley’s value is when he is himself, not the player who was so determined to be on his best behaviour during the Six Nations and was more passive than aggressive. If he were goaded into reacting by Smith when he should have counted to 10, he sought out George to let him know Northampton had scored a try. It was not on its own an act to deny him a World Cup place but it showed, again, that he has a point at which his senses take a vacation.
The length of the ban was significant. Hartley pleaded guilty and that, together with an apology, is usually enough to merit a halving of the four weeks the offence carries at the lower end of the scale. Two would have turned into three because of his poor disciplinary record and the reason for the full four weeks will be revealed when the panel’s judgement is made public.
A three-week ban would have meant England would have had a full complement of three hookers for the start of the World Cup. Picking Hartley in the 31 would run the risk of not having a hooker on the bench for the tournament opener if one of the other two were injured in the buildup but not seriously enough to merit replacing. The hosts cannot afford any embarrassment.
England have long known what they get with Hartley but he has not justified the faith the management team has long shown in him. Unless the ban is reduced on appeal, he faces getting no closer to the World Cup than his television. He used his head – but not in the way he needed to.
Dumb Penalties: ah yes, the familiar Irish refrain – someone else’s fault. Gerry today demanded that Clancy be held to account for giving a penalty to Glasgow for Ricky Lutton high-arming Matawalu. He also claimed Owens would not have given the penalty, which is rubbish. Sure, Matawalu embarrassed himself and Glasgow by going down like an Italian in the box, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t a penalty. It was, and it was so incredibly stupid at a critical stage of the game, that it still infuriates us now. And its funny – Gerry wasn’t demanding that Garces be held to account for a lopsided outcome in his favourite statistic – the penalty count – when Leinster played Bath .. would that have anything to do with the Irish team being favoured?
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