Jersey Reds - Administration???

Good Luck

From the Reds web site

Jersey Reds regret to confirm that the club ceased trading at 5.30pm on Wednesday September 27th and is exploring the way forward. However, liquidation appears inevitable unless a solution can be found in the very short term.

The professional side made the move amid a continuing backdrop of uncertainty about the future of English rugby’s second tier, having competed in the RFU Championship for the past 11 years and won the league last season.

The decision came with an admission that the club would be unable to pay September salaries due this week, and would not be travelling to south-west England to fulfil the scheduled Friday night cup fixture against Cornish Pirates.

Reds Chairman Mark Morgan said he was devastated that the move had to be made, but that it had become clear on Wednesday that there was no alternative.

“We had been able to start the season and maintain sufficient funds to cover the summer, but regret that our conversations with potential new investors as well as existing ones have been unsuccessful,” he said. “At one stage at the end of last season it appeared there was a viable way forward for the second tier once the new Professional Game Agreement was implemented from summer 2024, but Championship clubs have been left in the dark since that point and this led to a growing fatigue among those who may have invested, but could not be given any concrete assurance about when the new structure would come in, or how it would be funded.”

Tier two clubs have faced mounting financial challenges since the RFU first advised of major funding cuts in early 2020, prior to the onset of Covid-19. The pandemic then brought further cuts, with the challenging landscape for Championship clubs now having lasted for almost four years.

Mr Morgan said this week’s developments vindicated the 2022 move, supported by club members at an Extraordinary General Meeting, to separate the professional arm of the club from the amateur Jersey Rugby Football Club in order to safeguard the future of amateur rugby in Jersey.

The financial difficulties resulted in an even more difficult situation than the position encountered in November 2016, when cumulative losses made it necessary to raise £1.5million through a sale-and-leaseback agreement covering the club’s assets.

Other details covering the implications of this news have yet to be finalised, but are expected to emerge in the coming days and weeks.

A big blow for clubs due to have home games against them - no doubt CP will take a big hit with our game tomorrow night being cancelled at such short notice.

I have booked 5 days with my wife in Jersey for the Caldy fixture. We will still be going because we loved our time on the island earlier this year but I will miss the huge conviviality of our time with Islander and Brizzer and all at Jersey RFC.

From what I have read liquidation appears to be inevitable and there is a good reason for this. Rugby is not a sensible business/financial  investment, it is only emotion, community and the generosity of benefactors that keeps it afloat. 

Sadly I am sure there will be more casualties appearing during the course of this season.

I am so sorry for everyone involved and affected at Jersey......despite getting hammered we loved our two matches against them last season.

The club is good enough for England to hold week long training camps at

The club is good enough for the RFU to put money ( it was £100's k) into to improve the facilities, so its good enough for England to hold training camps at.

If its good enough for that, why were they not allowed to take a position the Prem? having won the Champ last year. 

If they take that rightful position, they have 5k crowds in the winter with the likes of Bath, Northampton, Leicester etc. coming to the Island mid winter. It brings a massive tourist trade to the Island

The sponsors then stay, there is an end game, there is an income for many people on the Island that will throw money at the club by being a sponsor. They get a decent deal with Radidasson as the sole hotel to be used by travelling teams, they get the backing of the Island Government and tourism department, because of the footfall they bring through the arrivals lounge and the big part of the GDP the club will be to the Island. But by shutting off this route and not letting Jersey take their rightful (and Ill say that again because it is a fact) position in the Prem the RFU have as good as said "that's it for you, you're not one of our chosen clubs, we will cut off the blood supply and see how long it takes you to die"

This is a total different story to Wasps and Worcester.. this is a club that has been directly let down by the RFU.. 

Wrong very very wrong...

Is this a result in the massive cut in funding from the RFU or the uncertainty of the structure of the Championship going forward. Investors like certainty.