Harlequins
Quinssa: An Evening with Conor & Mark Part 1
By Prof
March 26 2010
Mark Evans was late turning up after getting back from slumming it at a very arduous conference at La Manga! He first apologised for being late and then welcomed us all from both him and Conor remarking that he felt like Morcambe and Wise before correcting himself and saying it was the Two Ronnies.
The first questions answered were from the questions submitted prior to the event.
Q. To whom will Conor O’Shea report?
ME. That would be me
Q. Which members of the first team squad will leave at the end of the 2009/2010 season (for whatever reason)?
ME. We’re not going to say that.
Q. Which members of the first team squad have yet to agree terms for the 2010/2011 season?
ME. All those who are staying have already agreed terms, there aren’t any contract negotiations still ongoing. [The event was the day before it was announced that Dave Strettle had signed for Saracens].
Q. To 30/06/2009 the total wage bill rose from £4.9 million to £6.0 million….with an increase in total employees from 91 to 94. How many of the 94 were playing staff? What part of the wage bill goes on playing staff? How does Quins’ wage bill for players compare with that of other clubs? ( Are we correct in thinking that the current “salary cap” in the UK is £4.0 million? Is this for all staff or only for players? What are Quins’ current total staff numbers?). Obviously we are trying to understand what funds (if any) might be available to strengthen the squad.
ME. Last year looking at the staff we had 35 senior players, 10 full time academy players, 15-20 playing support staff and approximately 30 non-playing staff.
The £4,000,000 wage cap covers everything paid to the players including wages, taxes, national insurance, agents fees, cars (something we don’t provide), payments to relations, payments by sponsors (something we don’t do) and other benefits in kind (eg paying for flights home), win bonuses, appearance money etc.
There is a £200,000 cap for the full time academy players with each academy player having to be paid less than £20,000 which means we can afford 10 full time academy players.
We spend up to the wage cap, most clubs except perhaps two (Leeds and Newcastle) spend the full wage cap, and I am only assuming about Leeds and Newcastle looking at their squads. We won’t talk about any teams spending over the wage cap.
Q. After stripping out the £700,000 Bloodgate costs there seems to have been a very large increase in the 2008/9 Operating Loss (from £622,000 in 07/08 to about £1,300,000?). To the layman it seems likely that losses in the current year will exceed last year? Mosaic has said it will support the Club with its £8 million loan until November 2010. Will Messrs Saville and Jillings continue with their financial support to the end of 2011?
ME. The difference between the two figures is the £700,000 Bloodgate costs so things are stable. The financial reports always show the support rolling year to year and I have every reason to think that Mosaic (our backers) will continue to support us in the future.
Q. As supporters (and season ticket holders) we are extremely interested to understand the issues that face the Club. It seems a pity to us that we have to “dig” so hard to get hold of information about the Directors’ views on issues that they feel to be important. For example, given that Mr Wall’s Chairman’s report in the Report & Accounts was partly addressed to supporters, could his report not have been made available on the Quins’ website?
ME. Putting the Chairman’s report on the web site is a very good idea.
Q. What is the long term vision at Quins?
ME. There will be a consolidation in rugby. To be at the top flight in rugby, alongside the likes of Leicester, Leinster, Munster Toulouse and ASM Clermont Auvergne (and at the second level of Northampton, Stade Français when they build their new stadium and Toulouse, although they are currently losing money), you will need a stadium of 15-20,000 and you’ll need to fill it most weeks. Many clubs in Europe are not viable.
You can be lucky and inherit a big stadium, Leicester had a 17,000 seat stadium when professionalism started and Toulouse have had a big stadium for a while. The clubs in the north and in the south-east had no crowds or stadia when professionalism started.
So you either share a football ground or build your own. We have put £15,000,000 into The Stoop and we’re not finished yet. As well as building a ground you have to build the crowd and you have to remain competitive.
Squad sizes are going to go down while player wages will be going up. No English squad will be more than about 42 next season. So you need to make sure that your 18-22 year old players are very good. Home grown players have a commitment to the club and an affinity with the crowd too. We want to have a good proportion of our squad to be home grown.
London Irish have a large Pacific Islander influence but they are producing more home grown players too. Saracens have had a large South African influx but their academy is producing good players too.
In France you can only have 35 players under contract. Toulouse aims to have a set ratio of equal numbers being home grown: from elsewhere in France: from overseas.
There are attractive incentives from the RFU to have a high proportion of English qualified players. Other teams are aiming to have more home grown players too.
We’re trying to not lose millions of pounds. The range of accounts in the premiership is really quite marked and it will get even more pronounced. Small clubs will come under more and more pressure.
The problem was how to grow a London club, that was very small when professionalism started, quickly enough to catch the really big clubs without generating huge losses. Our plan has always been to grow the crowd to 1000 below capacity and then to build. So far we have gone from a 7,000 seat stadium with a 3,000 crowd to a 14,000 stadium and a crowd of 12,000. Our aim in the next 5-10 years is to have a 16-18,000 seat stadium.
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It was a great night and fantastic to have a Q&A with Conor before the press conference happened
Laughing is good exercise. It's like jogging on the inside.
The game's afoot;
Follow your spirit: and upon this charge,
Cry — God for Harry! England and Saint George
Pardon me, although this may be true, I would reckon that players who have had the greatest 'affinity' or 'rapport' have been brought in from elsewhere.
And I wonder if Mark is implying that the number of games should be cut via a lower number in the league ( smaller squads). Also, I wonder if the 'old chestnut', ringfencing, will arise again. I support ringfencing for the benefit of the clubs that are able and willing to expand and for the protection of lower league clubs getting out of their financial depth.
