The new year is likely to be dominated by speculation surrounding the future of Jonny Wilkinson. His contract with Newcastle, the club where he has spent his entire senior career, ends in the summer and the club appears in no rush to agree a new one.
Wilkinson joined the Falcons straight from school as an 18-year old back in 1997 and he has become England's most iconic player. But Wilkinson's sporadic appearances since he dropped the winning goal in the 2003 World Cup final (30 starts in just over four years) and the 28-year old's reported salary in excess of £250,000, have led the club's owner David Thompson to question the value of retaining him.
In one sense, Thompson would be better off signing Wilkinson than ever before. From next July, clubs will be reimbursed to up £175,000 a year for every player they provide to the senior England squad and Wilkinson, despite a glut of emerging outside-halves jockeying to snatch his national jersey, will remain a central figure in Brian Ashton's plans as long as he remains fit.
However, a recent change in regulations means that clubs with the most England players are less well compensated. Newcastle provided Mathew Tait, Jamie Noon and Tony Flood to the World Cup effort, and their tight-head prop David Wilson is a player to watch, as long as he is not eclipsed by Carl Hayman at Kingston Park. Thus the Falcons are unlikely to get the full money for Wilkinson.
Thompson started things rolling earlier this month by parting company with Newcastle's conditioning coach Steve Black, who has an umbilical-like link with Wilkinson. Wilkinson's future was believed to be the central factor behind the parting. Given Black's length of time at the club, 11 years separated by a brief stint with Wales, the terse one-line statement from the club to break the news, spoke volumes. There was no tribute: that was left to the Falcons' director of rugby John Fletcher at his media conference later in the week.
If Black's departure was meant to rock Wilkinson, it worked. He will be free to speak to other clubs early in the new year, and while Black has yet to say what he will be doing in the future, the two will continue to work in tandem. Rival clubs are unlikely to be put off by Wilkinson's salary tag because of the RFU compensation and because of his commercial value. The arrival of Wilkinson would be a stimulus for season ticket sales and a corporate shot in the arm. While if he goes, Newcastle are unlikely to suffer many deserters, any more than Arsenal did when they sold Thierry Henry to Barcelona.
Even so, Wilkinson would be a loss for the Falcons, just as Black is. Loyalty is a rare virtue in the professional era and he has turned down offers in the past to remain at one of the Premiership's less fashionable clubs. Just as he formed a close attachment with Black, he was never likely to go anywhere while Rob Andrew was the club's director of rugby.
Andrew left more than a year ago to become the RFU's director of elite rugby, and with Black gone, so has the cement which stuck him to the Falcons. With Thompson not appearing minded to make Wilkinson an offer he cannot refuse, the door is open to clubs in France and England who, while they are bound to be wary about signing a player who has made so few appearances in recent years, will not be lost to the commercial opportunities which come with his signature.
He has already been linked with Leicester, but the Tigers' coach Marcelo Loffreda is intent on signing his Argentine compatriot Juan Martin Hernandez from Stade Francais. Northampton may be a more serious alternative: Carlos Spencer's contract is up, and while the Saints have been linked with the New Zealand outside-half Daniel Carter, their owner Keith Barwell has gone on record saying that he wants to sign more England players because of the compensation now on offer.
And perhaps after so long at one club which is now shorn of two figures who were such an inspiration to him, now is the time to move on. Newcastle have a ready made replacement in Flood, but there is another value to Wilkinson the Falcons would do well not to forget: he is, as he showed during the World Cup, a match-winner who inspires those around him and unnerves opponents. Wilkinson, the double-edged sword.
