Financial dividend for IRFU

Rugby World Cup Making millions: The financially extended Irish Rugby Football Union (IRFU) are in line to receive €380,000 as a result of the Irish team's run to the quarter-finals of the World Cup last autumn in Australia. The tournament was once again a commercial success and realised a net profit of €97.3 million to the IRB, an increase of 36.81 per cent on the 1999 World Cup.

Ireland's cut of the profits would have been €76,000 more had they reached the semi-final stages of the event but would have been as little as €228,000 had they not advanced out of their pool to meet France in the knockout stages. This amount is in addition to any of the sponsorship and endorsement deals agreed by the IRFU.

The commercial success of the event is explained by record gate receipts, strengthening commercial relationships and importantly, a cumulative television audience of 3.4 billion, up 400 million on the previous tournament.

This was achieved despite a drop in the number of countries that received Rugby World Cup broadcasts. The number fell from a competition high of 214 in 1999 to 194 in 2003.

For the first competition in 1987, just 17 countries received broadcasts to a cumulative television audience of 300,000 million.

In all €6 million was made available in the form of participation contributions to the 20 unions that reached the Australian finals.

A total of 83 unions were involved in the competition from the early qualification stages onwards, most of them of course not qualifying for the Australian finale.

The International Rugby Board (IRB) also declared that the number of people coming through the turnstiles for the six-week tournament topped 1.9 million. With a game average of 39,580 in ticket sales, this netted them a €46.2 million profit.

Total receipts for the event were €124.3 million, which compared favourably to the €106.3 million in 1999, and €5 million in the inaugural New Zealand-hosted tournament in 1987, when the surplus was just €1.5 million.

However, while the IRB were, overall, satisfied with the success of the tournament, they did voice concern over the inability of some of the smaller countries to field their strongest teams as a result of clubs refusing to release contracted players.

The South Sea Islands in particular were hit as New Zealand, English, French and Australian clubs declined to release players for the duration of their contracts as domestic leagues and cups progressed throughout the World Cup.

The IRB have now promised to do more to strengthen the position of smaller nations.

"It is recognised that greater attention must be paid to closing the gap between the 'haves' and the 'have nots'," the Board said.

"And the money made from last year's tournament will be used to fund rugby's development over the next four years."

Another notable point was the cost of insurance for the 2003 World Cup, which at €1.5 million, came in at over double the cost of the previous competition.

"This is typical of a troubling trend within the game worldwide," said the IRB.

The anti-doping programme was also the most extensive in the history of the game.

There were 511 doping controls (307 of them out of competition), which included the test for the new drug THG, and all proved negative.

1999 2003

Gate receipts: 72m €120.9mTournament cost: €37.9m €74.7m

Tournament profit: €34.1m €46.2m