LIMBO FOR SARRIES
SARACENS are one loss from limbo, with the Government’s new coronavirus restrictions looking to have set back the start of rugby’s second-tier Championship.
The European Cup semi-finalists, relegated after a Sportsmail investigation exposed their huge salary cap breaches, have no idea when their next meaningful game will be if they lose to Racing 92 this Saturday.
They are about to ‘fall off a steep cliff’, as one source put it, because the Championship’s 2020-21 season may not now start until the new year. With no prospect of fans returning to grounds any time soon, most second-tier clubs don’t have the finances to resume paying players.
Saracens boss Mark McCall said: ‘It was looking likely that the Championship season would start in mid-December, but that may have changed which is really worrying for the Championship clubs, ourselves included.
‘It doesn’t take a genius to guess that if England don’t get crowds during the autumn and the Premiership doesn’t start having crowds before Christmas, it’s going to be a really worrying time for the international scene and also at club level.’
Next week the RFU are expected to meet Championship club owners to thrash out a plan for the season, but sources have told Sportsmail some teams do not intend to train until November.
The England stars staying at Sarries — Owen Farrell, Jamie George, Maro Itoje, Elliot Daly and the Vunipola brothers — will have Tests between October and December, then a Six Nations in 2021 to prepare for. But McCall has not ruled out loaning the internationals to other clubs next spring if some need game-time before the Lions tour. ‘We will see whether they need any more games, or if a few Championship games will suffice,’ he said.
Six hours before yesterday’s test event against Gloucester, Bath were told by the Government they were not allowed to host 1,000 fans. Bristol’s test event — their match against Leicester next Wednesday — was also canned. There are fears among Premiership clubs that more drastic wage cuts and redundancies may have to follow in 2021 if fans do not return or a state bailout is not sufficient.
Bath chief executive Tarquin McDonald said: ‘The longer this goes on, the more difficult it’s going to be for the survival of a number of clubs. We need to see full crowds back by the spring. If that doesn’t happen, it’s really very challenging.’
Darren Childs, Premiership Rugby’s CEO, added: ‘ We believe the lack of supporters in our grounds could cause irreparable damage to our clubs and the communities they serve, so we must find a way forward to avoid this.’