Saints Q&A: Tom Vickers talks to CEO Mark Darbon

A man who has rightly received much credit from supporters for the work he has done since arriving at the Gardens back in 2017, Darbon appears to be an extremely safe pair of hands.

I caught up with him this week to discuss several topics, particularly in light of the sad recent demise of Worcester Warriors and Wasps.

Below is the question and answer session in full...

Q: What is the feeling from Saints about the current financial situation in the Premiership?

A: "These are clearly challenging times across the league and first and foremost our thoughts go out to all the people involved at Worcester and Wasps, particularly the players, staff and supporter bases.

"It's important to realise that the financial challenge across Premiership Rugby is not a new thing. If you go back to pre-pandemic, the clubs lost an aggregate of £45million in the year before the pandemic.

"But what we've got at the moment is this particular cocktail of circumstances that is really impacting that model.

"You've got the lasting impact of Covid, which is still impacting us, and has put a lot of people's business plans back two, three, four years.

"In addition to that, you've got economic uncertainty and the cost of living crisis, which drives the cost base across the clubs up and it makes it harder for people to part with their cash and buy tickets, hospitality and merchandise - all the things the clubs rely on.

"It's challenging times for sure, and hopefully we can evolve things positively for the future."

Q: How sustainable is your model at Saints?

A: "Relatively, we're in pretty good shape.

"We've had a pretty clear strategy where we try to operate within the envelope of our own resources.

"We're not like some of the other clubs where their model means they are heavily reliant on the deep pockets of an individual owner who is willing to pump in cash on a regular basis.

"We've always strived to be successful on the pitch and find that sweet spot where we're financially sustainable.

"We want to generate enough revenue to cover our costs. We're not there at the moment for some of the reasons I touched on earlier, but we're okay.

"On the commercial side, we continue to try to be really innovative to drive the revenue into the club.

"We're blessed because we've got such a strong supporter base that stands by us.

"We continue to try to do new things to protect and enhance our revenue, and the Barbarians game that we have just announced is a good example of that.

"On the cost side, we have to be pretty prudent so in the last couple of years we've not been the highest spenders in the league in terms of investment into our squad.

"We place a lot of emphasis on our overall strategy of young, English and high potential in the team so we work really hard through our Academy system. We're really proud that 70 per cent of our squad are home grown and 100 per cent of our backline last weekend came through our Academy, which is a big part of our strategy and it helps us towards financial stability.

"We run a pretty tight ship across the board and we're focused on the right things, but we're not quite there yet so we've got to continue to be really prudent in our approach.

Q: Are you able to currently spend up to the salary cap? And do you feel pressure from fans' expectations for the team to do so?

A: "I'd like to think most of our supporters want a club that can thrive into the future so it's our job to make sure we've got a model that does that.

"It's not all about absolute spend - it's about assembling a squad that can be really competitive, and we feel really good about our squad at the moment.

"We're aware that we've been a bit more inconsistent than we'd like, but you don't have to look too far back to see us go on a really strong run.

"The back end of last season is a great illustration of that because we came away from that semi-final loss at Tigers not feeling like we were the plucky underdogs in that game who were lucky to be there. We should have won that game and we feel like it was a massive missed opportunity.

"We're optimistic about the squad we've got at the moment and excited for the future, but at the same time we have to be really prudent because we need a club that can thrive into the future."

Q: Is recruitment and retention more difficult this year than ever before with the changes to the salary cap, which will be lowered and with only one marquee player allowed?

A: "Recruitment and retention has always been challenging because selecting players, getting the right ones, getting the balance right across the squad is never an easy task.

"One of the things that makes it challenging as we look ahead is the fact that the salary cap came down during the pandemic and we supported that decision because it was the right thing to do, in our eyes.

"But with a lower salary cap and a reduced number of marquee players that you're allowed, it forces you into some difficult decisions.

"We all love Dan Biggar. He's a world class player, he's one of the nicest blokes you could ever meet, but when we looked at the nature of our squad moving forward, we felt like it was the right decision to part ways with Dan and look to the future in terms of the No.10 spot.

"There are always difficult decisions but the changes to the cap and the number of marquee players is amplifying that."

Q: When Saints sit at the table at league meetings and you talk about what you would like to see for the future of the Premiership, what kind of suggestions do you have?

A: "The exam question here is really clear and to me that is 'how do we take these thrilling matches we've got week in, week out and continue to deliver that really positively?'

"At the moment, the games are close, they tend to be really high scoring, the ball in play time is on the up and by almost every metric the Premiership is the best league in the world.

"On the pitch, we're in pretty good health, but we've got to move to a more sustainable position where the league and clubs are confident not just about survival but about growing the league and delivering it to more people.

"The objectives are really clear and how you do that is a big part to do with the audience. We've got to get more people interested in, excited by and engaging with Premiership Rugby.

"There are more than nine million rugby fans in the UK and not a big enough percentage of that nine million engages week in, week out with Premiership Rugby.

"How can we attract more fans into the proposition, get them driving attendances, get them driving the broadcast figures and helping us drive sponsorship and other revenue streams? If we can get the audience bit right, everything flows from that.

"That's part one, and part two is in an ideal world decoupling the overlaps that exist between the Premiership matches and the international game. It's difficult to say you've got the best league in the world when you've got a significant number of weekends when you're playing those matches in the shadow of the international game.

"So can we come up with a structure whereby those overlaps are non-existent or at the very least minimised right down because that then gives our product room to breathe.

"The league have talked about being the beating heart of rugby in this country and it's difficult to deliver on that if you're playing some of your games in the shadow of the international matches.

"One of the other things we've got to do that supports both of those aims is to tell the story of the Premiership better.

"You'll have seen recently at Saints that we spent quite a lot of time with our brilliant in-house team producing behind-the-scenes content trying to give people an insight into what it's like to be in this environment and also some of the personalities involved in our setup.

"One of the reasons we're doing that is because we've seen other sports use content successfully to build interest in their proposition. The Drive To Survive series in Formula 1 is a brilliant example, the Welcome To Wrexham series that is on at the moment is another great example.

"They are having a really positive impact on those sports and on those clubs or organisations so that is a big priority for us at club level but also more broadly across the league."

Q: It was mentioned a while ago that Saints wanted to be part of a documentary. Have you made any progress with that?

A: "Our ambition there came at the wrong time because we started that process pretty actively but then Covid struck and all bets were off.

"One of the reasons we're investing some time of our in-house team into the bits footage we're producing at the moment is to create a shop window into what we can do and to tell a bit of the story around rugby and try to get it on the agenda again for some of those distributors or content houses that might be interested in that stuff into the future.

"It's definitely still firmly on our agenda for sure."

Q: I know people have been impressed with the innovation at the club and we've seen that Bath and Harlequins have followed Saints in setting up a fixture with the Barbarians next month. You've clearly got a brains trust at the Saints so who is involved in that and coming up with the ideas?

A: "One of the things I'm incredibly proud of here is that we've got a brilliant team, and that concept was a joint effort across a few of us.

"We're delighted to have come up with that idea because when you lose a game, it places really significant stress on your financial model so each Premiership game for us at Saints is worth between £350,000 and £450,000 and when you're operating in a tight financial environment as it is, losing something like that is really significant.

"We wanted to lay something on for our supporters that made them happy and gave them the chance to see some really good rugby here at Franklin's Gardens but also enables us to protect some of that commercial income because if we lose it, the consequences are really significant.

"We felt like a game against the BaaBaas was the next best thing behind playing a Premiership game.

"It's interesting that others have now done similar and what do they say? Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.

"We're pleased to have got that game over the line and it's been really well received by our supporter base.

"We've got a really great group of people here across our marketing, communications, operating teams who come together and try to generate some of those ideas and put them into practice."

Q: Are you eager to be the Premiership's trendsetters?

A: "We are incredibly proud of the history and heritage of this club and it's really important to what we do, but we also set out to try to be forward thinking within the world of rugby.

"A lot of the people we've hired here at the Saints have come in with the view that the sport has been very traditional, it's been quite insular both at club level and at league level.

"We're keen to come up with ideas that move the club and the proposition forward.

"To be really clear, some of the things we're coming up with are not brand new.

"We quite often look at what other sports are doing, but how can we beg, steal and borrow that but make it relevant to the environment, the supporter base and the commercial partners we have here at Saints?

"Tunnel Club was a great example because that started in the NFL and then Tottenham Hotspur did it over here and we said 'we can be the first rugby club to deliver a similar proposition'.

"It's not because we just like being the first, it's because doing things like that serves a purpose as part of our supporter engagement strategy and our commercial plans.

"The final thing I'd say is that the performance guys are really important on this front: the players, coaching and rugby staff.

"One of the first things we did when we were looking at a replacement fixture for Worcester was to go and chat to Phil Dowson and say 'here's the impact commercially of losing this game, we think the route to dealing with this commercially might be another match, are you supportive of that and how do we make it work?'.

"We're really luck because the folks we've got in the performance side of the club see the bigger picture and are really focused on making sure we're successful on the pitch and off the pitch, too."

Q: How have you found the new coaching team and has it taken off as you have wanted it to so far?

A: "I'm not surprised by how it's going because we had a lot of confidence in the coaching group we had in place and we planned their transition from Chris (Boyd) for a long time.

"Dows (Phil Dowson) is excellent. He's a brilliant communicator, he sees the bigger picture and he's a leader of men so the other staff and the squad have taken really warmly to Dows in the director of rugby seat.

"Sam Vesty stepping up as head coach, he was doing a lot of that role anyway under Boydy, and we know Sam's got a brilliant coaching brain.

"The other tweaks we've made, integrating James Craig alongside Ferg (Matt Ferguson) and Vassy (Ian Vassy) is all going well in part because we've got very experienced heads of department.

"We've got Matt Lee in medical, Shieldsy (Paul Shields) in recruitment and retention, Tommy Bullough in S&C, Ross Appleton in analysis, Mark Hopley, who is doing a sensational job running the Academy.

"We feel pretty good about it but if you asked any one of those individuals, they would still be frustrated that we've been a bit inconsistent on the pitch this season.

"We've looked brilliant in moments, running over every team we've played for periods of the game, but we need to do it more consistently and we're confident the results will come."

Q: You brought Fin Smith in recently - is that it now for the rest of this season or could you look to bring in more players who are out of contract after what has happened at Worcester and Wasps?

A: "I don't think we'll see a huge amount of movement this season, but this is the time of year where you're thinking about your squad over the next one, two, three, four, five seasons and what that looks like.

"That's a continuous process but there are some players who have become available that you otherwise wouldn't have thought would be available.

"We're definitely evolving our thinking on recruitment and retention given what's going on across the league, but that's just one part of a broader process that we have."

Q: One things the players and coaches here have said is that the powers-that-be at Saints have been good at communicating the financial situation. How important do you feel it has been for you to do that?

A: "We try to keep people updated and one of the frustrating thing is that there has been a lot of uncertainty that we've been wrestling with.

"It can be frustrating because you want the answer but there isn't a clear answer.

"A good example at the moment is whether any of the fixtures are going to be rescheduled in the second half of the season because we are down Worcester and we might be down Wasps.

"I'd love to go straightaway to our coaches and our squad and tell them definitely what's happening, but that's somewhat out of our control.

"We're influencing those decisions and discussions but we're not responsible for making them.

"It's hard because we can't always be precise with the information, but we learned a lot through Covid.

"We tried to be really transparent with all members of our organisation during Covid to say 'this is where we're at, this is what it means for us, this is what we don't know yet but here are the things we can control and this is what we're doing about it'.

"We've tried to keep going with that mindset and if you're a player and you've got a mate at Wasps and they're suddenly out of a job, that's a pretty harrowing situation so I need and want everyone here to have confidence in what's going on around them to make sure they can focus on doing their best work day in and day out because that's how we'll win more matches and move towards a more sustainable model for the future."

Q: Finally, how are you finding life at the Saints and are you enjoying it considering it seems to be such a challenge given all the things that are going on in the world?

A: "I've said lots of times before that I love it here at Saints because we've got a brilliant club, great people, a wonderful supporter base, an amazing roster of commercial partners so I really enjoy the people we work with.

"I am acutely aware that there are a lot of challenges in our game at the moment and that can be frustrating because we can see a pathway through some of that and we need to make sure we don't let governance or bad decision making slow us down on that journey.

"We're not going to get there overnight and there's no quick fix, but we're clear on the direction of travel, we've just got to not let the governance and decision making slow us down. That can be frustrating at times but I feel we're in good shape and we want to kick on this season, have a good season commercially and win something.

"We want to turn this high-potential group into a side that is consistently challenging for the major honours."