World Rugby chiefs urge leading nations to help minnows amid cash crisis

World Rugby’s executive committee are set to review the current agreement
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Chris Jones9 November 2017

World Rugby chiefs are to press leading nations to share match revenue to help smaller nations reap the kind of financial reward Samoa will miss out on when they play England and Scotland.

Standard Sport understands revenue sharing is possible under the current agreement but not mandatory for the major Unions, who rely on gate receipts to fund the sport in their own areas. World Rugby’s executive committee are set to review the agreement in the wake of the Samoan Rugby Union’s declaration of bankruptcy.

Any proposed change to the way the tours agreement is implemented would go to the World Rugby Council, which sits twice a year.

The RFU are making a £75,000 “gesture of goodwill” to Samoa before the Twickenham match on November 25 but point out that World Rugby bank tens of millions of pounds from each World Cup to help smaller nations.

England, who will make around £8million from the Samoa game, only share out their receipts if they arrange an extra autumn Test outside the agreed international window and would then be expected to give a “thank you” to the Premiership clubs for releasing players and also a fee to the opposition.

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