Player exodus expected after Worcester fail to pay September wages
Crisis club Worcester are facing an exodus of players and staff after failing to meet this month’s salary commitments. Contracted personnel were due to be paid on Friday but the PA news agency understands this has not happened, meaning staff are entitled to move elsewhere after a statutory two-week notice period.
In a further blow to Worcester’s hopes of overturning their current suspension from competitions, the subsidiary body to which staff are contracted faces a winding-up order in the High Court next Wednesday. If WRFC Players Ltd is liquidated, the Gallagher Premiership club would automatically have no contracted players or staff and seemingly no option but to drop out of the top division.
WRFC Players Ltd is separate from WRFC Trading Ltd, which is subject to insolvency proceedings and for which the administrators are still seeking to find a buyer. Worcester’s debts total more than £25million, including at least £6m in unpaid tax, while owners Colin Goldring and Jason Whittingham have been accused of asset-stripping the club.
The club failed to meet a Rugby Football Union deadline on Monday requesting proof of insurance cover and funding for the club’s monthly payroll, which resulted in them being suspended from all competitions and this Saturday's away match against Gloucester being cancelled. Two consortiums, one involving former Worcester chief executive Jim O’Toole, are understood to have expressed interest in buying the club out of administration.
But the impending exodus of players and staff may make a purchase less appealing, with no means to resume playing even if the club’s current suspension is lifted.
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Don’t pay a blind bit of notice to Lukie… he likes the sound of his own voice and is always looking for something controversial to say. He has been banging on about Leinster's defensive system all season like he knows something Jacques Nienebar doesn’t. Which is the reason why he didn’t apply for the job obviously
Go to commentsI’m all for speeding up the game. But can we be certain that the slowness of the game contributed to fans walking out? I’m not so sure. Super rugby largely suffered from most fans only being able to, really, follow the games played in their own time zone. So at least a third of the fan base wasn’t engaged at any point in time. As a Saffer following SA teams in the URC - I now watch virtually every European game played on the weekend. In SR, I wouldn’t be bothered to follow the games being played on the other side of the world, at weird hours, if my team wasn’t playing. I now follow the whole tournament and not just the games in my time zone. Second, with New Zealand teams always winning. It’s like formula one. When one team dominates, people lose interest. After COVID, with SA leaving and Australia dipping in form, SR became an even greater one horse race. Thats why I think Japan’s league needs to get in the mix. The international flavor of those teams could make for a great spectacle. But surely if we believe that shaving seconds off lost time events in rugby is going to draw fans back, we should be shown some figures that supports this idea before we draw any major conclusions. Where are the stats that shows these changes have made that sort of impact? We’ve measured down to the average no. Of seconds per game. Where the measurement of the impact on the fanbase? Does a rugby “fan” who lost interest because of ball in play time suddenly have a revived interest because we’ve saved or brought back into play a matter of seconds or a few minutes each game? I doubt it. I don’t thinks it’s even a noticeable difference to be impactful. The 20 min red card idea. Agreed. Let’s give it a go. But I think it’s fairer that the player sent off is substituted and plays no further part in the game as a consequence.
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