Samoa broke

Autumn Tests: Samoa rugby is bankrupt, says country's prime minster - http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union/41915435

Interesting that this has now come.to head.just before the AIs. Looks as if it's slightly like blackmail to the unions involved with games pending. More money or no game. Can or should the unions really be going round wr at all puts them in a bad area when it doesn't seem that clear what the dispute with samoa and wr actually is.

The main problem is their corrupt PM who is also head of the Samoan rugby union. World rugby had to cut funding to Samoa due to corruption in their union.

Genuine question - would they have paid Wales for appearing in the games over the summer?

Maybe the AB's could could put their second string out instead?

Why nz?

The Media/Snowflakes are already suggesting that the RFU should give all the ticket sales money to Samoa when they play them later on in the AI series.

Why?

Which media?

TightHEAD wrote:The Media/Snowflakes are already suggesting that the RFU should give all the ticket sales money to Samoa when they play them later on in the AI series.

Why?

Some English players (Vunipola and Tuilagi I think) also suggesting teammates should pay £1000 each to the Samoan players to help balance the match fees a bit.

Griff wrote:

TightHEAD wrote:The Media/Snowflakes are already suggesting that the RFU should give all the ticket sales money to Samoa when they play them later on in the AI series.

Why?

Some English players (Vunipola and Tuilagi I think) also suggesting teammates should pay £1000 each to the Samoan players to help balance the match fees a bit.

As long as the money goes to the players. Whatever happens we need to protect the guys on the pitch

No 7&1/2 wrote:Which media?

BBC "The news puts pressure on other nations - England in particular to share revenues from games with the Samoans."


Why England in Particular?

We hosted the RWC in 2015 to help fund World Rugby after the loses made in 2011.

Ah. No it doesn't mean the bbc are suggesting it happen.

Completely World Rugby's problem IMO. If you put this on the individual Unions, then World Rugby will completely wash their hands of it which will ultimately lead to the whole thing collapsing (or the rich nations breaking away).

I agree. There's no way unions should be passing money. If the players wanted to share their fee good on them let them crack on. I do think match fees do need serious consideration by wr and unions though.

42 player NZ touring squad.
Call the Somoan bluff. Cancel the game due to break of contract and arrange England seconds versus AB seconds instead. First 15's keep their powder dry and everyone's a winner except for anyone who believes Trumptian deal making (blackmail) is the way to promote Rugby Union.

You face having to offer everyone a refund who has bought a ticket. Was thinking about across the AIs though rather than just to fill the england game void. Doubt nz would want to do it though and would probably.levy it to ask for that additional funding anyway.

Samoa only have two games

Scotland then England.

IMO a percentage of the gate receipts should be given to the visitors. Something proportionate to the number of fans expected to be there. even if it's 10%! This would then fairly distribute money to unions who don't get regular home games

They don't get regular home games because it's not financially attractive to anyone.

Someone on this board has explained it really well using cricket as an example, think it might have been robbo, apologies if it wasn't robbo!

Essentially though, it boils down to the same thing. If you get a union propping up another union(s), you're penalising the richer union. All that will happen is the richer unions will break away and form their own league/tournament. The Unions need to be left alone to run their businesses, so that they can develop their team in their own economies.

Growing the game is world rugby's problem.

Has any analysis been done and presented to the world as to what is happening with Samoan rugby.

Ie what the finances in's and out's are etc.
What is world rugby doing about it?
How many home games do samoa have? Do they need more. Do they need to build a bigger stadium to be able to host more games and thus bring in money...??

GeordieFalcon wrote:Has any analysis been done and presented to the world as to what is happening with Samoan rugby.

Ie what the finances in's and out's are etc.
What is world rugby doing about it?
How many home games do samoa have? Do they need more. Do they need to build a bigger stadium to be able to host more games and thus bring in money...??

They are in the middle of the Pacific with a population under 200k. I'm not sure a bigger stadium will help.

Many Samoans donated money to the national team before the world cup and the players received none of it.

Once again their prime minister who is also head of the SRU  is asking for the Samoans to donate money to the union again. Nobody loves their national team as much as the Samoans do and once again the people are being taking advantage of!

Scottrf wrote:

GeordieFalcon wrote:Has any analysis been done and presented to the world as to what is happening with Samoan rugby.

Ie what the finances in's and out's are etc.
What is world rugby doing about it?
How many home games do samoa have? Do they need more. Do they need to build a bigger stadium to be able to host more games and thus bring in money...??

They are in the middle of the Pacific with a population under 200k. I'm not sure a bigger stadium will help.

Well if their current stadium is at capacity for games, and they expand to a bigger stadium, they might attract more touring sides thus more income...

Wales toured there during the Lions tour, and their Stadium in Apia was very run down. I would rather they had help with their rugby infrastructures, i.e, help them get a better place to play, then perhaps they could host more games.

RFU are gonna chuck em 75 grand, which is what they did for Fiji the other year.

How does the finance of a game actually work.

Ie England /Wales / Scotland etc host Samoa or Fiji or Tonga in a game at HQ.
How much will Fiji, Samoa, Tonga actually get financially?

Maybe an agreement could be made for the host increasing the payment to tier 2 sides? Just one option.

GeordieFalcon wrote:How does the finance of a game actually work.

Ie England /Wales / Scotland etc host Samoa or Fiji or Tonga in a game at HQ.
How much will Fiji, Samoa, Tonga actually get financially?

Maybe an agreement could be made for the host increasing the payment to tier 2 sides? Just one option.

Nah that won't work, we have already had the likes of New Zealand demanding half the ticket sales, if we start giving that to the Fiji's/Tonga's/Samoa's of this world then we will open a can of worms.

Frankly a discussion needs to happen with the unions and wr. And if you want to block me ld get away from a thread I wrote!

GeordieFalcon wrote:How does the finance of a game actually work.

Ie England /Wales / Scotland etc host Samoa or Fiji or Tonga in a game at HQ.
How much will Fiji, Samoa, Tonga actually get financially?

Maybe an agreement could be made for the host increasing the payment to tier 2 sides? Just one option.

They don't get any revenue but the host nation picks up the bill for accommodation and expenses of the visiting team while they in the country apparently.

If Fiji, Samoa, Tonga et al don't come and play us, we don't get a game. There's no financial incentive for us to go touring the pacific islands which means it's all a bit take take take form the home unions.

I'm not advocating a 50.50 split like the ABs were after, but I do think a 10% to 15% of gate revenue should be given to the visiting team

tigertattie wrote:

GeordieFalcon wrote:How does the finance of a game actually work.

Ie England /Wales / Scotland etc host Samoa or Fiji or Tonga in a game at HQ.
How much will Fiji, Samoa, Tonga actually get financially?

Maybe an agreement could be made for the host increasing the payment to tier 2 sides? Just one option.

They don't get any revenue but the host nation picks up the bill for accommodation and expenses of the visiting team while they in the country apparently.  

If Fiji, Samoa, Tonga et al don't come and play us, we don't get a game. There's no financial incentive for us to go touring the pacific islands which means it's all a bit take take take form the home unions.

I'm not advocating a 50.50 split like the ABs were after, but I do think a 10% to 15% of gate revenue should be given to the visiting team

Absolutely. I was very surprised that it wasn't the case when I first heard.

I reckon the First tier nations should make a minimum number of visits to second tier nations over an agreed period.

Rotated so we all play the 2nd tier nations at some time.

All income from those matches goes to the 2nd tier nation

I was under the impression that the host nation paid the visiting nation a fee to play them. (I don't know this for a fact, I just remember reading something about it). How that money is then distributed is on the nation itself. The price of that match fee is determined, basically, by how much money the host nation will make from the fixture and how badly they want to play the team in question. New Zealand wanted 3 million to play England this Autumn, so the RFU said no.

If you were to split gate money on a percentage, then Samoa, Tonga, Fiji et al would never ever play a tier one nation in the pacific islands again. And that wouldn't be the tier one nation refusing to travel, it would be because Fiji Samoa and Tonga would be begging NOT to play a home fixture, since an away fixture would be more lucrative to them. I'd wager that's the case now tbh. Whatever fee the Samoans are getting is probably better than they would make if England were them playing in Apia.

World Rugby invested millions into the pacific Islands last year I think? The problem is the way it's spent and it doesn't find it's way to the right places. Getting a share of gate receipts isn't going to change that.

Earlier, the head of the Samoan union said they can't afford to pay the players insurance and so the matches against England and Scotland were in doubt.

Chris Jones from the BBC is now reporting this is bobbins, as World Rugby pay for that, and the logisitcs (along with hosting Unions).

geoff999rugby wrote:I reckon the First tier nations should make a minimum number of visits to second tier nations over an agreed period.

Rotated so we all play the 2nd tier nations at some time.

All income from those matches goes to the 2nd tier nation

Geoff, I believe this is in place which is why we've all been touring there more over the past few years. The IRB/World rugby was concerned that the summer tours were mainly between the tier 1 nations so insisted on a rota for us all to tour more 2nd tier nations. As a result Wales went to Japan first up (4 years ago), we went to Samoa and Tonga this year. Scotland went to Fiji. Ireland have been to the US, etc. It was (I think) a 5 or maybe 10 year programme of tours but it was done by the IRB as opposed to the tier one/'home' nations deciding it themselves.  I'll see if I can find a link.

Griff wrote:

geoff999rugby wrote:I reckon the First tier nations should make a minimum number of visits to second tier nations over an agreed period.

Rotated so we all play the 2nd tier nations at some time.

All income from those matches goes to the 2nd tier nation

Geoff, I believe this is in place which is why we've all been touring there more over the past few years. The IRB/World rugby was concerned that the summer tours were mainly between the tier 1 nations so insisted on a rota for us all to tour more 2nd tier nations. As a result Wales went to Japan first up (4 years ago), we went to Samoa and Tonga this year. Scotland went to Fiji. Ireland have been to the US, etc. It was (I think) a 5 or maybe 10 year programme of tours but it was done by the IRB as opposed to the tier one/'home' nations deciding it themselves.  I'll see if I can find a link.

Think this is it:

http://en.espn.co.uk/scrum/rugby/story/115768.html

No 7&1/2 wrote:Autumn Tests: Samoa rugby is bankrupt, says country's prime minster - http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union/41915435

Interesting that this has now come.to head.just before the AIs. Looks as if it's slightly like blackmail to the unions involved with games pending. More money or no game. Can or should the unions really be going round wr at all puts them in  a bad area when it doesn't seem that clear what the dispute with samoa and wr actually is.

Yeah they timed the announcement well.

James Fitzgerald, who is the media manager for World Rugby, is now saying that World Rugby Paid Samoa 1.5 million pounds for 2017 which specifically included insurance, flights and prep camp for the Nov tests.

If you haven't seen it (and you're interested), you should watch the documentary "Samoas missing millions". In 2011 the Samoan government launched an appeal to the people of Samoa for 1.5 million quid (6 million tala) to fund the team for the world cup. The target was reached and the players were treated to training camps with no balls and paid 200 quid a week. The same administration are still running the Samoan union.

The economics of Rugby are mostly reflected by the economics of a country as a whole, so there will ALWAYS be a disparity for a country like Samoa. Clearly though, that problem is bigger than rugby. This problem is so far away from being the RFU's and the SRU's though.

Samoan rugby has been a mess (previously Fiji has had issues; not sure about Tonga). It is badly run and an excuse for political nepotism.

World Rugby needs to take over Samoa rugby. Give their games over to Fiji, Tonga, Uruguay, Namibia, etc. if they refuse.

In the long run, a 10-20% fee to the away side would be reasonable. Anything more would be questionable and push certain teams to only want to play England, France, Ireland.

Ah right reading the above...its much deeper than just a rugby financial issue in Samoa.

In that Case its a WR issue not the individual unions.

My understanding was that the RFU a number of years ago - pretty much funded the Churchill Cup, taking on the development responsibility for N.America and other visiting sides. I know this has now been scrapped (which is a shame as I always wanted to go on tour there). But by that argument, if any union is going to take on the development responsibility for the PI sides then shouldn't that fall more under the remit of the SANZAR nations? Or more specifically NZ and OZ.

As said above developing rugby surely is the remit of World Rugby and not the responsibility of individual unions - despite relative wealth.

How is it the responsibility of the RFU, or any other union to look after Samoan rugby ?

Samoa need to look after themselves - handouts dry up when sympathy runs out.

They should put together a joint PI touring team called the Southern Stars made up of Samoa, Fiji, Tonga and NZ Maori. They would exclusively tour SA, NZ and Australia with tour games and tests following the Lions' template every four years.

To balance out the fun - USA, Canada. Argentina and next ranked S American Union could also form their own touring conglomerate to do the third SANZAR rotation.

That's what World Rugby would do if they were interested in helping these countries...

GeordieFalcon wrote:Ah right reading the above...its much deeper than just a rugby financial issue in Samoa.

In that Case its a WR issue not the individual unions.

It is the unions fault... The Samoan people and WR have donated millions to the Samoan team since 2011. The decline of Samoan rugby has been astonishing since their peak in 2015 and now we have this. Things have to change in the SRU and the first thing that must happen is get the prime minister and his cronies out of the SRU.

Griff thanks for the link

The Great Aukster wrote:

They should put together a joint PI touring team called the Southern Stars made up of Samoa, Fiji, Tonga and NZ Maori.

How does that help? Samoa, Fiji and Tonga are struggling to finance the teams they have, how would having to help fund another team help unless the NZRU fund it and they are always crying poverty as well

cascough wrote:I was under the impression that the host nation paid the visiting nation a fee to play them. (I don't know this for a fact, I just remember reading something about it). How that money is then distributed is on the nation itself. The price of that match fee is determined, basically, by how much money the host nation will make from the fixture and how badly they want to play the team in question. New Zealand wanted 3 million to play England this Autumn, so the RFU said no.

If you were to split gate money on a percentage, then Samoa, Tonga, Fiji et al would never ever play a tier one nation in the pacific islands again. And that wouldn't be the tier one nation refusing to travel, it would be because Fiji Samoa and Tonga would be begging NOT to play a home fixture, since an away fixture would be more lucrative to them. I'd wager that's the case now tbh. Whatever fee the Samoans are getting is probably better than they would make if England were them playing in Apia.

World Rugby invested millions into the pacific Islands last year I think? The problem is the way it's spent and it doesn't find it's way to the right places. Getting a share of gate receipts isn't going to change that.

I read an old article yesterday from the Samoan Rugby Union that said that when they hosted NZ in 2015 they ended up losing 200000 dollars. Make no mistake, the pacific Unions don't want rich (I'm going to stop saying tier 1 now, because it's not about that) nations to go there, they want to come here and take a slice of our revenues.

The rich nations are rich because of their economies. It's got little to nothing to do with Rugby. This is soley World Rugby's problem IMO.

cascough wrote:

cascough wrote:I was under the impression that the host nation paid the visiting nation a fee to play them. (I don't know this for a fact, I just remember reading something about it). How that money is then distributed is on the nation itself. The price of that match fee is determined, basically, by how much money the host nation will make from the fixture and how badly they want to play the team in question. New Zealand wanted 3 million to play England this Autumn, so the RFU said no.

If you were to split gate money on a percentage, then Samoa, Tonga, Fiji et al would never ever play a tier one nation in the pacific islands again. And that wouldn't be the tier one nation refusing to travel, it would be because Fiji Samoa and Tonga would be begging NOT to play a home fixture, since an away fixture would be more lucrative to them. I'd wager that's the case now tbh. Whatever fee the Samoans are getting is probably better than they would make if England were them playing in Apia.

World Rugby invested millions into the pacific Islands last year I think? The problem is the way it's spent and it doesn't find it's way to the right places. Getting a share of gate receipts isn't going to change that.

I read an old article yesterday from the Samoan Rugby Union that said that when they hosted NZ in 2015 they ended up losing 200000 dollars. Make no mistake, the pacific Unions don't want rich (I'm going to stop saying tier 1 now, because it's not about that) nations to go there, they want to come here and take a slice of our revenues.

The rich nations are rich because of their economies. It's got little to nothing to do with Rugby. This is soley World Rugby's problem IMO.

They lost money because they had to make significant upgrades to the stadium because of the amount of broadcasters they were expecting and because NZ wouldn't play there otherwise. Now that the upgrades have been implemented, they should be able to make money off the home games.

Saying that, I wouldnt want any tier 1 nation playing there until there are significant changes in the SRU

World rugby could improve their facilities. This is all typical life style issues. The Samoan union is exactly like the ex wife of a friend of mine.

Many years ago my mate split with his partner, they had a young child. His ex would always moan and groan about how he was never giving her enough money, she even hoodwinked all of us, but then my mate explained, that if he knew the money was going on his kid, and not into her pocket for her wild nights out and lifestyle then he would hand it over, but he said that he was offering to buy anything for the kid, and go and pay for anything, he just did not want to hand the money to her.

And this is the same thing world rugby faces. Rather than give Samoa money, offer to pay direct for things, like a stadium refurbishment, upgrade on facilities, hand over any player payments direct to the players, even equipment. I would never hand money over to the Samoan RFU and trust them to do the right thing with it.

But there is a need for a review on how funds are distributed. A story about a mate avoiding his child payments doesn't alter that.

LordDowlais wrote:World rugby could improve their facilities. This is all typical life style issues. The Samoan union is exactly like the ex wife of a friend of mine.

Many years ago my mate split with his partner, they had a young child. His ex would always moan and groan about how he was never giving her enough money, she even hoodwinked all of us, but then my mate explained, that if he knew the money was going on his kid, and not into her pocket for her wild nights out and lifestyle then he would hand it over, but he said that he was offering to buy anything for the kid, and go and pay for anything, he just did not want to hand the money to her.

And this is the same thing world rugby faces. Rather than give Samoa money, offer to pay direct for things, like a stadium refurbishment, upgrade on facilities, hand over any player payments direct to the players, even equipment. I would never hand money over to the Samoan RFU and trust them to do the right thing with it.

Why should WR finance it though?

The WRU spent years in debt financing the Millennium/Principality, should WR have lent a hand there?

Whats to stop those running Samoan Rugby from selling off the silver once WR have done the upgrades?

marty2086 wrote:Why should WR finance it though?

Because obviously it's in WR's interests to help Samoa. Also, their economy is not good enough to finance it for themselves, perhaps help in the way of a loan could sort them out.

marty2086 wrote:The WRU spent years in debt financing the Millennium/Principality, should WR have lent a hand there?

Yes you are right, and it was to the detriment of rugby in Wales, grass roots rugby is in a mess, if it were an animal, it would be on the critical endangered list. Hopefully the new regime can turn the mess Roger Lewis made around.

marty2086 wrote:Whats to stop those running Samoan Rugby from selling off the silver once WR have done the upgrades?

Who would they sell a rugby stadium, and rugby training facilities to ?

LordDowlais wrote:

marty2086 wrote:Why should WR finance it though?

Because obviously it's in WR's interests to help Samoa. Also, their economy is not good enough to finance it for themselves, perhaps help in the way of a loan could sort them out.

How is it in their interests?

LordDowlais wrote:

marty2086 wrote:Whats to stop those running Samoan Rugby from selling off the silver once WR have done the upgrades?

Who would they sell a rugby stadium, and rugby training facilities to ?

They are made up of parts which have a value