Machinations behind new European tournament are a preview of things to come

A working party, the make-up of which was agreed at last week’s meeting between all the stakeholders in a new European Cup, will hold a key meeting in London today to further draw up plans for the putative competition. Critical to this will be finding a compromise television agreement given ERC’s and Premiership Rugby’s conflicting deals with Sky and British Telecom.

If the latter can be resolved, perhaps with joint coverage, then it is hoped that details of the new competition will be announced by the conclusion of the Six Nations. This was the deadline suggested yesterday by the Welsh RFU chief executive Roger Lewis, who is one of those on the working party along with representatives from France, England and Wales. Ian Ritchie, the RFU chief executive, has seemingly emerged as a key broker between Sky and BT.

Ultimately, as outlined last week, the new European Cup will consist of 20 teams instead of the 24 which competed in the Heineken Cup. This will comprise of the top six of the English and French Leagues plus seven from the Pro12 – including the highest-ranked team from Ireland, Italy, Scotland and Wales. The 20th place will be reserved for an extra team from the winner's country.

The financial share-out will be a three-way split between the respective qualifying leagues. It will be interesting to see how the respective unions and federations, along with Regional Rugby Wales, LNR and PRL, decide upon a new governing structure. Seemingly the European Cup and its Challenge Cup equivalent will be run by a Six Nations committee in place of the ERC, while a third tier competition will be run by Fira and this (or possibly both) will be based in Geneva.

It will be intriguing to see how much of Premiership Rugby’s reported €193 million four year deal with BT hinged on the three year rights to European Cup games involving English clubs. Likewise, how much of that and Sky’s three-year deal agreed with ERC (reported to be worth in the region of €85 million per year) will actually now materialise. The issue of title sponsors and commercial partners will not be broached until a television deal is reached.

Everything they demanded
It will be no surprise if the new competition is called the Rugby Champions Cup; the title devised by PRL for its proposed breakaway Anglo-French competition. The PRL have got everything else they demanded, so why not this?

Their partners in all of this have been BT. The ERC board, including PRL representative Peter Wheeler, had given the green light to their new four-year deal with Sky in June 2012. The PRL deal with BT was announced in September 2012. The PRL and LNR may argue that they had served notice of their intention to withdraw from the Heineken Cup prior to the ERC board meeting in June, but by not disagreeing to the Sky deal they tacitly supported it.

As Philip Browne, the IRFU chief executive, pointed out, it was "extraordinary that they [PRL] have sold rights to something they don't own and in territories they have no jurisdiction in." This allegedly incorporated games in Ireland, with Browne describing the PRL/LNR tactics as akin to a stick-up.

Why did BT make a deal to buy a product that didn’t exist, preferring to deal solely with PRL rather than the game’s governing body, as they have done with the the FA and Uefa in securing rights to English Premier Division and Champions League games?

In response, not unreasonably, the French, Italian and Celtic federations and unions resolved to press ahead with a Heineken Cup run by ERC and televised by Sky, without or without English participation. But all has changed,.

In this, the English clubs have played their hand akin to a poker player bluffing with a pair of twos, albeit with a couple of trump cards. Their Anglo-French Cup not having worked, cue an Anglo-Welsh League. As this would seriously weaken any European competition but also destroy the Pro12, the alliance between the Celtic, French and Italians unions splintered and weakened.

Only show in town
The IRFU, fearing isolation, have rowed in with the only show in town. Significantly, whereas others sent full delegations to last week's meeting, the IRFU sent only Browne. Money has won out, further strengthening the hand of the English and French clubs, who were prepared to crash and burn the European game, but will now have greater means to cherry pick the best players from elsewhere, until such time as their next hissy fit.

On the plus side, a framework is being outlined for the future. For the last few months, there had been little or nothing for anyone to hang their hat on. The ripple effect should not only see the Pro12 fall into place, but assuredly make it a better competition too.

Admittedly, this still won’t assuage the evidently reluctant Welsh regions, who preferred an Anglo-Welsh League, even though they themselves must now realise they were led down the garden path by PRL.

In addition to a new breed of club owner, a new breed of commercially driven chief executives at union level has emerged. Standing idly by have been the so-called world governing body, the IRB, whose president Bernard Lapasset is part of the French Olympic Committee putting together a Paris bid for the 2024 Olympic Games.

In their delusion, the IRB may think it still runs the game, and will be in ten years' time, but one ventures they may be in for a surprise.
gthornley@irishtimes.com