Anscombe ‘target’ of $1m offer from Bath
Todd Blackadder’s English club Bath is poised to dangle a near $1 million a year deal to lure Kiwi playmaker Gareth Anscombe from Wales, according to an English newspaper report.
A report in the Daily Mail said Bath would consider offering Anscombe £500,000 (NZ$953,000) a year to switch from Pro 14 club Cardiff after this year’s Rugby World Cup.
The report claimed Anscombe is on £350,000 (NZ$667,000) a year at the Cardiff Blues where he is off contract at the end of this season.
If Anscombe accepts the Bath deal, it would mean the end of his Wales test career due to the Welsh Rugby Union’s rule of allowing only players with 60 or more caps to be selected from foreign clubs.
Anscombe – who has a Welsh mother – has won 24 caps for Wales since his debut in 2015.
The 27-year-old started at first five-eighth in Wales’ 21-13 Six Nations win in Cardiff last weekend, kicking three penalties before he was replaced by Dan Biggar, in a significant substitution.
Anscombe’s Cardiff coach John Mulvihill said in January he was confident the Kiwi star would stay because of his desire to represent Wales at the 2023 Rugby World Cup.
‘‘He’s an integral part of my group and our success going forward. He acknowledges that and all his mates play for the Blues, he lives in the area and his mum is from Cardiff so it needs something quite special for him to move,’’ Mulvihill told Wales Online.
‘‘He doesn’t want to go and play in the English Premiership because he wants to play test rugby here for Wales, not just for this World Cup.
‘‘He wants to go on. He believes he could play again in four years time so we just need to sit down and iron out the final detail. Hopefully, we will have a decision sooner than later.’’
Before the test against England, Anscombe spoke of his pride at his Welsh blood.
‘‘I knew I was Welsh growing up,’’ he said on Wales Online.
‘‘My mother was born and bred in Cardiff and my two grandparents were from Wales, too.
‘‘It wasn’t like I found out five years ago I could come here. My mother is really proud that I get to pull on a red jersey and although both her parents aren’t with us anymore they always let me know about my Welsh heritage.
‘‘I had a New Zealand jersey cut in half with a Welsh jersey and I used to wear that as a little kid running around.
‘‘It’s a really proud moment for me, every time I get a chance to wear that famous red jersey. It’s a huge honour and it certainly makes the hairs on the back of your neck stand up when you run out at that famous stadium we have.’’