Exiles given more time to complete the takeover
to give the ailing club another week to complete their takeover. It is an unexpected move given the point of the deadline was to provide clarity for all parties, not least Premiership bosses, who are under pressure to come up with a financially viable league structure for next season.
A 10-team top flight would remove club and country fixture clashes and has, for a while, been Premiership Rugby’s preferred number – but they wanted to achieve it through competitive means.
It is two years since the RFU voted to expand the Premiership to 14 teams, believing as they did that such a bloated division would “improve financial stability and sustainability” of the professional game.
That did not age well, with Worcester and Wasps folding in the autumn, London Irish now teetering on the brink and, in the most challenging season the English game has known, only Northampton posted a profit (£300,000 pre-tax).
So Sweeney’s union yesterday proposed a temporary reprieve to the Brentford-based club.
Wages are due to drop into bank accounts today. If they fail to materialise, players will again be at liberty to submit breach-of-contract notices. Last month this was averted with minutes to spare. There is little confidence anywhere that this deal will be done but owner Crossan is understood to still believe in it and, while he does, the union are loath to cut it off at the knees.
Rival clubs are preparing to pounce for the Exiles’ leading players, including England squad duo Henry Arundell and Tom Pearson.
❒ FRANCE star Mohamed Haouas has been sentenced to a year in prison for domestic abuse – and had his move to Clermont Auvergne terminated by the club.
The Montpellier prop, who was arrested for hitting his wife for smoking, is likely to lose his World Cup place.