Australian Rugby Union CEO Bill Pulver "is in discussions with the five Australian Super Rugby franchises to find a new way of operating the teams in the wake of the Western Force’s financial difficulties," according to Bret Harris of THE AUSTRALIAN.
Even with a significant increase in revenue from the ARU’s new multimillion-dollar broadcast deal, "most of the Super Rugby teams are still struggling financially, particularly the Force."
The ARU bought the Force’s intellectual property for A$800,000 ($610,000) "to help the club out of financial difficulty, but work remains to be done to shore up their position." Pulver: "The thing I want to stress is this is an issue surrounding Super Rugby financials overall. It’s not just a Western Australian issue. It’s a dialogue we are having with all of the CEOs and boards of Super Rugby clubs. There are financial challenges across rugby league and other codes as well. It’s a bit of an industry-wide issue. It just so happens that one of our first dialogues is over here in the west." Pulver said that "it was too early to say whether a new Super Rugby financial model would be created, but the clubs needed to find ways to cut costs." Asked whether any new Super Rugby model would involve greater centralization, Pulver said, "To be determined. All I can tell you at this point is we are having a very open discussion with all of the Super Rugby clubs, their CEOs, boards and directors."
But Pulver conceded the ARU would "most likely" enter into some kind of partnership with the Force to help them recover financially (THE AUSTRALIAN, 3/30).
