Lawrence Dallaglio reassures fans of 'brighter' financial future for Wasps
Despite an emotional attachment to Wasps, where Dallaglio has served as a player and director, his concerns transcend his club
By Charles Richardson, Rugby Reporter 7 September 2022 • 5:40pm
Wasps director Lawrence Dallaglio has revealed that the club's financial future will be "much brighter" in the next few days as their season gets under way at Gloucester on Sunday.
The Midlands club owes bondholders £35million after they invested in a scheme in 2014 to raise money for the club and pay off its debts. Those investors should have been repaid in May. According to the BBC, too, Wasps have been in discussions with HMRC over unpaid tax; have had to manage repayments of a Sport Survival Package loan; and failed to pay Coventry City Council an agreed fee to take over the lease of land next to their Coventry Building Society Arena home.
But Dallglio, 50, has reassured supporters that the situation will improve imminently.
"There will be some statements in the next few days that will present and paint a much brighter picture about the club," Dallaglio told Telegraph Sport. "There are a number of sides to the Wasps business which make it both complex and unique: there’s a rugby club which, like every club, has had its challenges; then there is a business on the other side which, contrary to what you might read, has been performing well. The complexity is that the rugby club is wrapped into the business; so what is - and can be - reported is not necessarily the big picture.
"They have a bond that needs refinancing and I’d love to be more candid but I cannot at the minute. There will be some statements coming out which will hopefully put us in a much better position; but there’s no imminent threat to the club.
"Nothing is ever quite as it’s reported. Someone like me knows that better than anyone else. There are three sides to every story. There’s one side, the other side, and the truth."
Dallaglio made 326 appearances on the back row for Wasps over an 18-year stretch and captained the club to four Premiership titles and two European Cups and, since 2015, he has been a director at the club. Despite an emotional attachment, his concerns transcend his club.
"I’m emotionally attached to rugby - not just to Wasps," Dallaglio, who won 85 caps for England, added. "There are five clubs up for sale at the moment, so please don’t sit there and tell me that rugby union in this country doesn’t have its challenges.
"But it’s not in crisis. The future of rugby has plenty of potential but I don’t think the game has grown exponentially since I retired; the game has been professional since 1995 and the same problems that existed then still exist now."
Dallaglio believes that all of rugby's stakeholders should be doing more to market the sport and make it as attractive a proposition as possible for prospective new fans.
"When you play rugby, for 80 minutes of the week, you are enemies; that’s what we want," Dallaglio said. "But, the clubs, Premiership Rugby and the Rugby Football Union need to be much more aligned in terms of what they want in the game. When we’re not playing against each other we need to grow the sport. We need to celebrate it and we need to get the players much closer to the public. And the highest-profile players need to understand that they are the people that are going to drive that: Ellis Genge, Owen Farrell and Marcus Smith - and others.
"We have to appeal to a much wider audience. My daughter has become a Formula 1 fan overnight because she understands the players; Drive to Survive is one - but not the only - reason. The stakeholders, players and clubs need to work a lot harder together. Covid has exacerbated that because it’s pushed people apart.
"My mood is upbeat, though - as there is massive potential for the sport. It’s not bright and rosy right now but we have turned a corner and there is room for optimism."
The perennial thorn in the Premiership's side, however, is how it can be effectively marketed when a large cohort of the league's best players are missing for large chunks. For Dallaglio, there is no easy answer, but reducing the number of matches is not the solution.
"I don’t think that’s necessarily the way to move it on," he said. "I don’t know what the answer is, but we have a block of 10 Premiership games to start the season which is very exciting - I can’t remember the last time that happened. What we want is our best players playing in those games, and not all of them will be. I don’t know how you get over that but it’s not easy to follow when the best players aren’t playing every single week."
Always a Wasp
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