Super League players are set to take further pay cuts for an indefinite period as the chief executive of one of the competition’s leading clubs warned of the sport’s financial situation deteriorating still further.
Top-flight players, with the help of the Rugby League Players’ Association, had initially agreed salary reductions of 30-50% for the three months from April, while the domestic season remained on hold. The RLPA had hoped the cuts would be temporary but the union’s organiser, Garreth Carvell, confirmed they will now continue into July and beyond.
“We’d like to set it to a maximum cut of 15% and get as close to that as possible across the board,” he said. “We’ve worked closely with the clubs in recent months and we have a strong relationship, but we’ll get this reviewed every month.”
The RLPA will work with clubs based on their own financial situations rather than pushing for a game-wide figure, and the Warrington chief executive, Karl Fitzpatrick, has insisted rugby league is by no means out of the woods despite the proposed return to action next month. The Wolves are one of the sport’s richer clubs but have a shortfall of £1.4m in the past four months.
“The financial landscape is changing all the time but it’s very challenging and it will certainly get worse before it improves,” he said. Fitzpatrick could not guarantee whether the cuts would stop next year. “We can’t discuss that when we don’t know what we’ll look like. That’s premature.”
The Warrington chairman, Stuart Middleton, said the news of football’s Wigan Athletic entering administration was a warning for rugby league that the road back to financial stability will be far from straightforward.
“That was a real shock,” he said. “It’s going to be a two to three-year recovery for our sport and there will be a lot of casualties along the way. It’s hard enough for rugby league to break even as it is and this is the tip of the iceberg; there’s more to come within our sport certainly.”
Carvell is uneasy with the attitude of Super League clubs who have agreed to sign players while the sport is proposing cuts across the board. “It doesn’t sit right really,” he said, “and it might bite them when the players who they’re trying to persuade to take pay cuts ask – and rightfully so – why they are doing that when their club are looking to sign new players? I’d like to think contracted players are looked after as a priority.”
