IRL Annual Report

[Dave T]

Haven't had chance to read it yet, apparently talks about WC profit.

International Rugby League releases 2023 Annual Report (intrl.sport)

But - one interesting (or not) thing I did notice - have a look at the background on the Contents page. There is a world map - but there seems to be a rather worrying omission. The UK has been wiped from the map. Are we officially cancelled? Bit weird!

[Dave T]

IRL Chair Troy Grant said: “It is no secret that the Achilles heel for international rugby league for far too long has been the absence of an International Calendar. “The ad hoc nature of tournaments and international matches, and the absence of any clarity for nations, players and fans to plan their seasons, is over.

Sure Troy, sure.

[Lowdesert]

11 minutes ago, Dave T said:

Haven't had chance to read it yet, apparently talks about WC profit.

International Rugby League releases 2023 Annual Report (intrl.sport)

But - one interesting (or not) thing I did notice - have a look at the background on the Contents page. There is a world map - but there seems to be a rather worrying omission. The UK has been wiped from the map. Are we officially cancelled? Bit weird!

Regarding the map, it shows how much interest and input our three representatives have.  

[Coggo]

'The overwhelming majority of income over any four-year financial cycle is generated from the hosting of the Rugby League World Cup. The 2022 accounts include the first staging of the World Cup since the UK Company scaled up its operations, having historically had modest income levels compared to its operating costs.

In 2022, the company received £4.81m of income, most of this being from the World Cup. In the financial year ended 31st December 2022, the company had £1.04m of operating costs. This produced an operating profit of £3.76m. This compared to an operating loss of £489k in the previous financial year.

The principal categories of administrative expenditure are a bad debt provision, the costs of the IRL management team and the costs of third-party professional advisers. The bad debt provision relates to monies outstanding from the World Cup at the time of signing the accounts. The company is still vigorously committed to the recovery of this money and the provision has been made for tax mitigation purposes on the advice of professional advisers.

Notwithstanding this provision, savings in total operating costs were achieved for a second successive year. Grants payable to full members and confederations continue to be administered through the Australian Company rather than the UK Company.

Interest of £136k was paid during the year at a commercial rate on the loan from the Australian Company. This means that overall the UK company made a trading profit of £3.63m, on which it paid corporation tax of £160k.

The company’s balance sheet shows that the surplus in the year has enabled it for the first time to have a healthy, positive balance sheet going forward.'

[Damien]

So looking at this it is fair to say that the RLWC did make a fair profit for the IRL, even after all of the issues and delays:

In 2022, the company received £4.81m of income, most of this being from the World Cup.

In the financial year ended 31st December 2022, the company had £1.04m of operating costs. This produced an operating profit of £3.76m. This compared to an operating loss of £489k in the previous financial year.

This is obviously great news and shows what could have been if it wasn't for Covid and the delay.

[Damien]

So as was said at the time all that talk about needing to cut the World Cup size to reduce costs was just codswallop.

[JohnM]

50 minutes ago, Dave T said:

Haven't had chance to read it yet, apparently talks about WC profit.

International Rugby League releases 2023 Annual Report (intrl.sport)

But - one interesting (or not) thing I did notice - have a look at the background on the Contents page. There is a world map - but there seems to be a rather worrying omission. The UK has been wiped from the map. Are we officially cancelled? Bit weird!

Odd that. The UK WAS on the map until Satuday evening. 

[gingerjon]

9 minutes ago, Damien said:

So as was said at the time all that talk about needing to cut the World Cup size to reduce costs was just codswallop.

That's a far better financial position than I'd have expected - certainly given the mood music at the time. It's actually pretty decent. You could really build something special with that.

So best not bother.

[Damien]

1 minute ago, gingerjon said:

That's a far better financial position than I'd have expected - certainly given the mood music at the time. It's actually pretty decent. You could really build something special with that.

So best not bother.

I think it also show that the talk of £10+ million profit, before Covid struck and the delay, wasn't fantasy. It was very probable and that amount really would have been transformative.

[Eddie]

11 minutes ago, Damien said:

I think it also show that the talk of £10+ million profit, before Covid struck and the delay, wasn't fantasy. It was very probable and that amount really would have been transformative.

Do you think attendances would have been much higher if it wasn’t for Covid? There may have been a minor affect (eg elderly people got out of the habit of going to games) but the WC was well after that, things were completely back to normal. 

[OriginalMrC]

Hold on! This wasn't the narrative being spun at all. We were told it was a financial disaster and that international RL was dead

[gingerjon]

6 minutes ago, Eddie said:

Do you think attendances would have been much higher if it wasn’t for Covid? There may have been a minor affect (eg elderly people got out of the habit of going to games) but the WC was well after that, things were completely back to normal. 

We had another year of expenses and, for reasons I don't quite understand, RL attendances in general did not rise in line with those at other sports once restrictions came down.

[gingerjon]

5 minutes ago, OriginalMrC said:

Hold on! This wasn't the narrative being spun at all. We were told it was a financial disaster and that international RL was dead

It's still the narrative being spun.

Only the Great NRL and their $10m jolly can save us.

[Damien]

9 minutes ago, Eddie said:

Do you think attendances would have been much higher if it wasn’t for Covid? There may have been a minor affect (eg elderly people got out of the habit of going to games) but the WC was well after that, things were completely back to normal. 

I absolutely do think they'd have been higher. The whole year's delay had such negative impact when before that there was such positivity. The whole build up had been with 2021 in mind, promotion and marketing was pretty good, and there was decent momentum until the whole will it/won't it take place. 2022 then seemed a real struggle and costs became a factor, the negativity started and it was a completely different feel. RL also seemed to take until 2023 to really recover, even the 2022 SL season wasn't great for attendances.

Edited February 27 by Damien

[Sports Prophet]

1 hour ago, Dave T said:

Haven't had chance to read it yet, apparently talks about WC profit.

International Rugby League releases 2023 Annual Report (intrl.sport)

But - one interesting (or not) thing I did notice - have a look at the background on the Contents page. There is a world map - but there seems to be a rather worrying omission. The UK has been wiped from the map. Are we officially cancelled? Bit weird!

We can only dream Dave  

[Damien]

4 minutes ago, gingerjon said:

We had another year of expenses and, for reasons I don't quite understand, RL attendances in general did not rise in line with those at other sports once restrictions came down.

Yeah RL seemed a year behind the other sports in getting back to where it was after Covid. It was probably several factors around the direction of the game generally, and not just Covid, but there was certainly a general despondency, negativity and malaise post Covid in that 2022 SL season.

[Eddie]

5 minutes ago, Damien said:

I absolutely do think they'd have been higher. The whole year's delay had such negative impact when before that there was such positivity. The whole build up had been with 2021 in mind, promotion and marketing was pretty good, and there was decent momentum until the whole will it/won't it take place. 2022 then seemed a real struggle and costs became a factor, the negativity started and it was a completely different feel. RL also seemed to take until 2023 to really recover, even the 2022 SL season wasn't great for attendances.

Fair enough, I do know a few people who had tickets for 2021 but returned than and didn’t go in 2022.  I know a summer WC would never happen but that would be so much better for crowds too, some of the games I went to were in seriously miserable weather. 

[Derwent]

I assume the IRL income was from the hosting fee for the World Cup and not related to the actual tournament itself ?

Because the actual tournament over here made a loss of ~£415,000 even after receiving £13.4m of government funding.

[Damien]

Just now, Eddie said:

Fair enough, I do know a few people who had tickets for 2021 but returned than and didn’t go in 2022.  I know a summer WC would never happen but that would be so much better for crowds too, some of the games I went to were in seriously miserable weather. 

I know a few people like that too. For whatever reason the delayed 2022 version all of a sudden seemed to become far less appealing that the 2021 version. As a say it was a totally different vibe.

[gingerjon]

1 minute ago, Derwent said:

even after receiving £13.4m of government funding.

Ghastly. Vile. How dare the government even think of supporting sports events.

[Sports Prophet]

45 minutes ago, Damien said:

So as was said at the time all that talk about needing to cut the World Cup size to reduce costs was just codswallop.

you may be right Damien, you may not be. I don’t necessarily think the operating profit of the World Cup can be determined by the royalties paid to the IRL. It wouldn’t surprise me if the organiser had a base amount due and perhaps a few more to pay per certain metrics being achieved.

All those royalties being deducted may have seen the event run at a loss. Maybe. Maybe not. We don’t have enough information.

note: I haven’t read the report yet.

[Damien]

Just now, gingerjon said:

Ghastly. Vile. How dare the government even think of supporting sports events.

It's just a ridiculous point to make. Without the £13.4 funding the tournament would have been done completely differently. We've had a fraction of that funding and still put on profitable World Cups.

[Derwent]

5 minutes ago, gingerjon said:

Ghastly. Vile. How dare the government even think of supporting sports events.

Indeed. The tournament had income of £30.2m which was made up of :-

Government Funding & Grants   £13.4m

Match Income  £10.0m

Sponsorship £3.5m

Broadcasting £1.7m

Other Income  £1.6m

[gingerjon]

3 minutes ago, Damien said:

It's just a ridiculous point to make.

It's one that gets made a lot. And always presented as if it is evidence of weakness - as opposed to a really smart move (then not played as well as possible IMO) about accessing Northern Powerhouse funding in order to begin the process of an ambitious event. It was smart enough politically that the Tories committed to the Rugby League World Cup in their 2019 manifesto.

[Sports Prophet]

1 hour ago, Dave T said:

Haven't had chance to read it yet, apparently talks about WC profit.

International Rugby League releases 2023 Annual Report (intrl.sport)

But - one interesting (or not) thing I did notice - have a look at the background on the Contents page. There is a world map - but there seems to be a rather worrying omission. The UK has been wiped from the map. Are we officially cancelled? Bit weird!

I wouldn’t take it personally Dave, looking at that image, I don’t think Samoa, Tonga or Cook Islands are in it either  

Edited February 27 by Sports Prophet