Reducing salary cap will help clubs - Northampton CEO

Julia Chapman was previously Northampton's finance director and chief operating officer

Northampton Saints chief executive Julia Chapman believes the Premiership's salary cap must come down again if the game is to become profitable.

The cap is agreed by all member clubs and was increased from £5m back to £6.4m for the current season, having previously been reduced by £1.4m in 2020 during the Covid pandemic.

Northampton won their first Premiership title for a decade last season, but still reported a £1.7m loss - a figure Chapman expects to be lower this year.

She told BBC Radio Northampton: "It's hard to deny that rugby, not just Saints, but most of the clubs, is in a challenging financial position because it's not sustainable to lose money forever.

"Saints made a profit every year from 2000 to 2016 but there was a viable business model there and the club didn't have to look externally for support during that whole period.

"The thing that broke the model for us and the other clubs was the level the salary cap went up to - it went up by several million pounds over a very short period of time."

Chapman, who stepped up into the CEO role in November following Mark Darbon's departure to join golf's R&A, believes a desire to be competitive in Europe and a view that attracting the best players in the world to the Premiership was the best way to do it, was a big factor in the cap increase.

"I don't think [reducing the cap] is all the answer, that would be over-simplifying it, but if you're spending more than you're earning, you need to spend less or earn more," she said.

"Clearly our strategy is to grow the revenues, grow the audience but in the meantime I think some action needs to be taken on the cap, even if it's just for the short term so the clubs can get back on a sustainable footing."

She added: "There's a suggestion that the cap should be set at the level of the central income we get from the RFU and Premiership Rugby, which would see it come down by £1m, maybe a little more, from where it is at the moment.

"That would be dramatic, game changing, and I don't think it would damage our competitiveness."

After winning the title by beating Bath last June, Saints have struggled in the league this season and are eighth in the table, winning five of their 11 games so far.

They were knocked out of the Premiership Rugby Cup by Championship side Ealing at the quarter-final stage, but are still involved in the European Champions Cup with a home last-16 tie against French side Clermont coming up next month.

But the success of their academy has seen several players named in Steve Borthwick's England squad for the Six Nations, the most recent addition being flanker Henry Pollock who in 2022 became the club's youngest try scorer in the professional era, aged just 17.

"The academy model is hugely important to us and we've got a really strong track record of bringing players through that go on to achieve great success, said Chapman, one of two female chief executives in the Premiership, along with Andrea Pinchen of Leicester Tigers.

"There's huge value in that for the club because we're in a position to be able to spot the talented players that are coming up, perhaps when they are still at quite an early stage in their career, and you've seen this season people being given opportunities they wouldn't have had if they'd been in the open market trying to go elsewhere."

Northampton return to action on 21 March with a home East Midlands derby against Leicester.