Injuries and Covid left Wasps in mire — but they will find a way back
Stephen Jones
Sunday January 09 2022, 12.01am, The Sunday Times
If you are struggling as a team and a club, who would you least want to play in the immediate future? Most probably, you would want to avoid Leicester Tigers, steaming along with an immaculate record, and Toulouse, Europe’s aristocratic champions.
Tough luck. Wasps play the charging Tigers today in Coventry, and next weekend take on Toulouse in the European Champions Cup. At present the stated Wasps vision of becoming one of the elite clubs in Europe, challenging Leicester in the Midlands and other clubs wherever they play, seems to be hopelessly tattered, with difficulties seemingly everywhere.
So why do I believe that Wasps may well in time fulfil their ambitions, and that they have the basics laid down to become a club as big as any around?
They have been savaged in several ways by Covid. Their costs are spiraling in relation to income and average attendance for home games has fallen from 16,000 to just under 10,000. The need to cut costs has led to a loss of personnel in marketing, communications and other key areas.
Certainly, good fortune seems to have given way to catastrophe. Wasps have suffered injury devastation that is unprecedented in my experience. The whole thing was best summed up when they played Munster in a European pool game just under a month ago — or at least, when they tried to play Munster.
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On the morning of the game they were already having to cope with the absence of 18 senior players because of injury. Their two key forwards, the captain Joe Launchbury and the massive and influential flanker, Jack Willis, have not played a single second this season. Both Tom West and Ben Harris, starting props, have been missing almost all season, while behind the scrum, Malakai Fekitoa, their best back, was injured in the first game of the season and has not been seen since.
Just to put the boot in, Covid claimed four more players on the morning of the Munster game and during it, Brad Shields, who has been valiant all season as stand-in captain, was shown a red card. It was rather typical of Wasps’ fortunes that a few days after the game, Shields was exonerated and had therefore served a sentence without a crime.
The background does not appear encouraging. Since the club moved from High Wycombe to Coventry in 2014, one account reckoned that they had lost about £40 million.
When they switched, many expressed concern at the way they had funded their new cost base, largely as a result of a retail bond scheme, which at the time apparently left them open to demands for repayment in a reasonably short time.
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The sheer unpredictability of Covid and its impact does put finances on a precarious balance. Wasps are far from alone among professional sport clubs at the moment, though that does not diminish their concerns.
But there is an underlying picture that seems more encouraging. Recently, investors in the retail bond scheme agreed to a series of proposals that will help Wasps to maintain their finances and remove a little of the repayment pressure. (not seen this before)
It is also important to remember that Wasps are not renting at the CBS Arena — they own it (and rent it to the Championship football club Coventry City) and also own the casino and the adjoining hotel, with a second hotel to be built. There is a brand-new railway station at the complex, there are new catering facilities — and there will be further income and publicity as they host the Rugby 7s, wrestling and judo at the Commonwealth Games this year.
Their income will now come from several sources, as opposed to depending entirely on the oval ball.
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Recently, they made a highly significant addition to their buildings portfolio when opening their palatial training centre in Henley-in-Arden — this from a club that until 2015 trained in a smelly old gym. Their coaching group, led by Lee Blackett and the former All Black coach John Mitchell, is rated as highly as any.
Their supporter base may not be as big as it was when they first switched to Coventry and gave away free tickets, a practice they have now severely restricted. Those were the days of 30,000 crowds.
But the atmosphere on big-game days has been excellent and on Boxing Day, despite the tribulations, they attracted nearly 14,000 for their game — valiantly beating London Irish despite the strictures on their squad availability.
Honours appear well beyond them this season but optimism has been generated by the signing of the powerhouse Springbok prop Vincent Koch from Saracens.
The famed Wasps community remains strong, and perhaps above all, they retain their traditional fighting spirit on the field even when some of the players have hardly trained with each other, and which they once showed as a tiny club dominating Europe.
There are no certainties on the sporting scene, now or ever. Some of the numbers do not add up at present. But up close, the heartbeat is easily detectable.
Topic: Not all grim news - Stephen Jones in the Sunday Times (Read 3368 times)
Always a Wasp