Stadium for Cornwall project safe despite RFU funding cut to Cornish Pirates

The Stadium for Cornwall is planned for a site just off the A390 near Threemilestone

Cornish Pirates chairman Paul Durkin says the Stadium for Cornwall project will not be affected by the Rugby Football Union's decision to cut funding to second-tier clubs.

Championship sides, including the Pirates, were told on Tuesday of plans to slash payments from about £534,000 to a 2015 level of £288,000 per club.

Pirates are in the final stages of securing funding for the new stadium.

"It's completely outside the rugby club's playing funds," Durkin said.

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"It's a capital project, we know we're trying to finalise the government funding, and we believe we are very close to that."

The Pirates and Truro City Football Club are planning to move to the new stadium on the outskirts of Truro.

"It's not just a stadium for the Pirates, a lot of people still think that's what it is," Durkin told BBC Radio Cornwall.

"But it's always been that the Pirates are the driving force behind it - no question about that - but actually that's a stadium for all of Cornwall, it's for rugby, it's for football, it's for community,

"We do not see this as a problem for the stadium itself."

'They didn't have the guts to explain it face to face'

Cornish Pirates currently play their home games at the Mennaye Field in Penzance

Durkin remains very upset about the way the RFU announced their plans to the 12 Championship clubs.

The 12 chairmen were sent an email early on Tuesday morning ahead of their scheduled meeting in London, where they were joined by RFU chief executive Bill Sweeney and director of performance rugby Conor O'Shea.

"The anger was about the way it was done - to send a letter by email a couple of hours before we were supposed to meet," said Durkin.

"They didn't have the guts to actually explain it to us face to face first of all.

"We've been involved in negotiating contracts for next season and this has come so late in the day it's going to cause real problems for many of the clubs."