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England rugby union stars could be placed on ‘hybrid contracts’
By PA
England stars could be placed on ‘hybrid contracts’ as part of negotiations over a significant change to the way the national team is managed.
The Rugby Football Union and Premiership Rugby are in talks to give head coach Steve Borthwick greater control of a set number of Test players, the PA news agency understands.
Under the agreement, Borthwick would pick a group of internationals who he would see as providing the foundations of his squad for the 2027 World Cup.
In return for having more of a say on aspects of each player’s career such as conditioning, game time and position, the RFU would pay a larger sum to his club than the current amount of £40,000 awarded for every player supplied to the elite player squad (EPS).
If the agreement is approved, it would be one of the most significant changes to the English system since the game went professional almost 30 years ago.
While watered down from the central contracts that are a success in Ireland and New Zealand, they would break new ground given previous England coaches have had no influence over their players’ schedules when they are on club duty.
RFU chief executive Bill Sweeney raised the possibility of central contracts a year ago and there is a growing appetite among clubs battling against a bleak financial outlook to surrender some control of their Red Rose stars in return for compensation to help pay their wages.
Hybrid contracts have also been floated by Saracens director of rugby Mark McCall. Saracens supply Jamie George, Maro Itoje, Theo Dan, Ben Earl, Billy Vunipola, Owen Farrell, Elliot Daly and Max Malins to Borthwick’s current World Cup squad.
“It should be top of the agenda, central contracts. If there is an opportunity to do something a bit differently and for club and country to work very closely together over a particular player,” McCall said in March.
“Maybe share his salary? We all know the top international players will be unavailable for half your programme anyway.
“Probably down the years it has been unfair on the club to pay that player his full salary if that’s the case.
“You need to understand as well that as soon as the RFU starts to contribute towards someone’s salary then you lose a bit of control over that player, but I think that’s the right thing to do.”
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Latest Comments
oh ok, seems strange you didn't put the limit at 7 given you said you thought 8 was too many!
Why did you say "I've told you twice already how I did it but your refuse to listen" when you had clearly not told me that you'd placed a limit of 8 teams per league?
"Agreed with 4 pool of 4 and home and away games?"
I understand the appeal of pools of 4, but 6 pool games might not go down well with the French or the South Africans given already cramped schedules. I do still think that you're right that that would be the best system, but there is going to be a real danger of French and SA sides sending b-teams which could really devalue the competition unless there is a way to incentivise performance, e.g. by allowing teams that do well one year to directly qualify for the next year's competition.
Go to commentsFoster should never have been appointed, and I never liked him as a coach, but the hysteria over his coaching and Sam Cane as a player was grounded in prejudice rather than fact.
The New Zealand Rugby public were blinded by their dislike of Foster to the point of idiocy.
Anything the All Blacks did that was good was attributed to Ryan and Schmidt and Fozzie had nothing to do with it.
Any losses were solely blamed on Foster and Cane.
Foster did develop new talent and kept all the main trophies except the World Cup.
His successor kept the core of his team as well as picking Cane despite him leaving for overseas because he saw the irreplaceable value in him.
Razor will take the ABs to the next level, I have full confidence in that.
He should have been appointed in 2020.
But he wasn’t. And the guy who was has never been treated fairly.
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