Rob Baxter: Exeter boss says salary cap reduction could hit English clubs in Europe

Exeter were the last English side to win the Champions Cup, in 2020

Exeter boss Rob Baxter says English clubs could find it more difficult to win in Europe with a reduced Premiership salary cap.

The league has begun its first season of a three-year £5m annual salary cap in response to the financial effects of the Covid-19 pandemic.

The cap has fallen from a pre-pandemic level of £6.4m.

"I do think we've made it relatively tough for ourselves over the next couple of seasons," Baxter said.

Along with their maximum wage spend of £5m Premiership clubs are still able to have £600,000 worth of academy credits and two marquee players, whose wages do not count towards the cap, although that number will reduce to one from the start of next season.

Deals agreed before the cap rules were changed count at 75% of their value, to the £5m limit, but all new deals are valued at 100%.

Premiership clubs hope to be able to begin increasing the cap from the 2024-25 season.

"I think you're going to find a disparity at the start of the next two years and so hopefully that return to a fuller cap and the marquee rules and credits etc in a couple of years will help even that out," Baxter said before his side's Champions Cup opener against Montpellier.

"If you look at how hard it is to put a squad together in two years' time compared to some of the squads knocking around Europe, especially your top Irish provinces and your top French clubs, it's going to be tough."

Exeter brought in Scotland captain Stuart Hogg from Glasgow Warriors in the summer of 2019 and his compatriot Jonny Gray joined him a year later from the same club.

This summer the Chiefs saw Alex Cuthbert return to Wales, while Tomas Francis and Elvis Taione followed him as all three moved to Ospreys.

"You've got a group of players within the Premiership who've been used to salary levels that were there with a £6.4m plus bits and a pieces cap to down to a £5m cap, it's a big change," added Baxter.

"It's not like a couple of hundred thousand pounds, it's big chunk of what you'd spend on your squad, so that realignment of what salary expectations will be will be challenging and then that will also make other markets more attractive.

"The Welsh regions, the Scottish regions for your qualified players become more attractive, obviously the ability to recruit players into the Premiership rather than go to clubs outside the Premiership also will become harder.

"Going down to one marquee player as well, there's going to be a significant shift, probably a bigger shift than people really anticipate."