In rugby’s chaotic finances, breaking even is harder than winning the title

With their club captain out of contract at the end of this season, Northampton Saints, who take on Bordeaux-Bègles on Sunday in a rematch of last season’s Champions Cup final, face a dilemma.

Phil Dowson, Northampton’s director of rugby, was asked last month about George Furbank’s future and part of his answer could not have been more effusive about the full-back’s qualities.

“He is a huge part of this club and has come right the way throughout the system. He is the epitome of everything we try to do in the way of development,” said Dowson.

“He’s an outstanding, world-class full-back… there were people talking about him being an outside shot for the [British and Irish] Lions [tour].”

Sounds like a player you ideally would do everything to keep, correct? Except here is what Dowson also had to say about Furbank and the prospect of losing such a pivotal player.

“Seeing him be captain of the club and playing international rugby is exactly what we’re about, but it’s hard to balance it out from a financial point of view.”

The problem with a large chunk of your squad becoming established England internationals is that, naturally, their price goes up. “At some point, the offer outside is going to be better,” said Dowson.

The argument for Northampton keeping Furbank is obviously persuasive: a cultural cornerstone, a world-class talent. But there is more nuance to the situation, as explained by a source to The Observer. Furbank’s recent injuries may have been freakish, but he has still missed considerable time. Northampton have a wave of younger players whom they feel good about as long-term options at full-back.

Furbank’s age, not that he is ancient at 29, comes into the equation, too. As does the fact that the 2027-28 ­season, hypothetically the second year in a new contract for Furbank, is a Rugby World Cup year. Those seasons historically are brutally long for Test players, starting with the pre-­tournament summer training camps and finishing over a year later following the conclusion of England’s Nations Championship fixtures.

That may seem like a lot of detail around one player’s contract situation, but these are the dilemmas that clubs face across the Prem, working under a tight salary cap of £6.4m per season – compared with €10.7m (£9.3m) in France – while all posting financial losses every year. Objectively, pouring money into a professional rugby side must be one of the worst financial decisions you can ever make.

For those clubs with significant financial backing – Bath, Bristol – the show rolls on. If you are Northampton, arguably the best-run club in the country, it means having to weigh up which players you decide to re-sign – Alex Mitchell, Fin Smith, Alex Coles and Fraser Dingwall, all England internationals, headline the contract extensions so far, along with promising players Tom Lockett and Craig Wright – and which players who may have received more substantial offers from elsewhere and who you reluctantly move on from.

There is one more nugget to consider in that contract jigsaw. Next year Tommy Freeman and Henry Pollock, arguably Northampton’s biggest and brightest stars alongside Smith, are out of contract. Freeman is world-class and Pollock is trending in that direction while also emerging as the face of English rugby.

So, if you are Northampton, the mere prospect of either Freeman or Pollock playing elsewhere is enough to make you start checking down the back of the sofa for any spare change. Or in this case, to make Furbank an offer which you appreciate may not be the best one out there for him.

Not that Northampton deserve the label of “best-run club in England” based purely on their player contracts. Last November’s annual report confirmed that Northampton made a loss before tax of £1.8m last season, which might sound alarming but compared with the rest of the Prem is an excellent figure. In the previous tax year, each Prem club lost on average £3.4m. No wonder the prospect of franchising appeals to so many in the English game, with a start date of 2029-30 for the ring-fenced league suggested this week by The Times.

In the latest edition of the Leonard Curtis Rugby Finance Report, monitoring data from between the 2014-15 to 2023-24 seasons, Northampton received the best financial score out of all Prem clubs. “Our financial approach remains grounded in a fundamental principle: to operate within our means,” the Northampton chairman, Ella Bevan, wrote in the club’s recent annual report.

Northampton are fortunate to have an extremely dedicated fan base, regularly selling out season tickets, but it takes more than that to creep towards breaking even, a milestone that the club hope to achieve within the next few seasons.

Playing attractive rugby naturally puts more bums on seats, with Northampton selling out all of their home Prem games last year, but with a capacity of more than 15,000, their cinch Stadium was also an excellent venue for the Women’s Rugby World Cup. Investing heavily in the club’s academy has also come with a huge pay-off by producing quality players who have gone on to become England internationals. Not just through ­salary-cap credits, which max out at £400,000 to sign players as cover for their squads, but actual cash.

Five Northampton players are part of England’s enhanced Elite Player Squad this season, handing Northampton £100,000 for each, and when the rest of their England players are factored in from the wider EPS squad, Under-20s and counting Test appearance fees, it all adds up to what The Observer understands is a seven-figure sum, far more than received by most other Prem clubs.

Furthermore, this week Northampton announced a general meeting to be held at the end of this month, discussing proposals to issue up to £4m in new shares to a potential investor. Extremely valuable funds, as the club chase down financial stability.

Northampton may well end up winning the league or in Europe this season. Breaking even, given rugby’s recent financial climate, might be an even greater achievement.

Photograph by Bob Bradford – CameraSport via Getty Images