seasons out of the academy. They
may not get a lot of game time, play a
lot of Prem Cup, the A League. They may
get offered another contract there but
there’s a Championship club offering a
20-30% pay cut but to play every week.
I see that as a sideways movement.”
The idea is that many top Premiership
sides would rather sign the young
player who knows how Premiership
rugby works and has also played often
and starred in the Championship, rather
than the guy who made up the numbers
at a big club over a few years.
That’s for the whippersnappers. With
established names, Smith explains,
moving or renewing your contract where
you are is about fostering relationships
with top sides, checking on the realistic
ambitions of your players and also
understanding genuine market value.
Then we get to the veterans looking
for one last deal at the end of a career.
Doran Jones understands the lay of
the land, saying: “I was always very
pragmatic about it. Ultimately it’s a
business decision. Perhaps at your peak
you can command a certain wage and
offer good value through what you do.
There will come a tipping point in their
mind where they see you as expensive
or surplus. That can happen overnight.”
Smith explains what steps you can
take at this stage. If, say, a 33-year-old
lock sees his contract is up and knows
he will swap clubs, moves are made.
Running with the example, Smith says:
“We know which clubs around Europe
are looking for an experienced lock so
we’d go straight to those ones with a
CV and a highlights package. We’d say,
‘This is a guy you should consider’. In
addition, we’d speak to every other
club, within reason – there are some
you know there is no point picking up
the phone to. But the majority we’d tell
them we have this player, he’s out of
contract. ‘Are you interested, yes or no?’
“In a lot of cases it will be ‘potentially’
or ‘not right now’. With recruitment, a lot
of things have knock-on effects. So a
club might not want an experienced
lock when you speak at Christmas, but
they don’t know their own experienced
lock is going to leave. By the end of
January, when they know he will leave,
suddenly your guy becomes an interest.
“What’s frustrating for players and
what we try to educate them on is that
sometimes someone else must make a
decision for them to get a contract. You
might tell a player a club doesn’t want
a lock, then a month later one of theirs
retires because of injury. Things change.”
There is also the ‘joker’ market in
France, where clubs sign injury cover
throughout the season – rememberthat’s how Hagan was picked up by
Béziers. For older players, they must
calculate what staying on the treadmill
means. As Smith says of France: “When
a player gets to 31, 32 and is looking to
maximize his income before retiring, he
may have to take these options, though
it might not be the best for their rugby
or for looking after their bodies.”
Smith explains that at the top end a
two-year deal for a 33-year-old is likely
to have in-built clauses. For example,
a club might only activate the second
year depending on the number of
games a player plays in year one.
Sometimes there is no contract on the
table at all. If a player gets to June or
July, even late May, without offers, some
serious decisions need to be made.
And if the veterans start dropping
into England’s National One or lower
but are still looking for some good
‘cash contracts’ or smaller deals to
tick along while setting up their next
steps, the good agents will offer some
help and advice, but in most cases
this is the time for the player to begin
making the tough calls on their own.Special Report
Coach hire
Eddie Jones
in 2015The unknown
Russian sides like Enisei
offer a different experienceA ‘journeyman’?
George Smith moved
a lot as a player