Warriors Women keep the ball in play with 10-year funding partnership
In an exclusive interview with Sports Gazette, Warriors Women managing director Josh Payne has outlined the club’s ambitious future vision as they announce a long-term partnership with local business Cube International.
The 10-year deal with the innovative sports events experts, who work with many global sports organisations including Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games, Aston Martin F1 team and FIFA World Cup 2022, secures Warriors Women’s financial stability.
The partnership is contingent on the club securing one of the two available spots in the Allianz Premier 15s from next season.
“The deal with Cube International initially started back when administration first unfolded,” said Payne.
“At that point in time we sat down with the chairman, Andy [Moss], and discussed what that looked like for our future. All credit to Cube, they were so supportive and offered us real flexibility on what we believed that should look like.
“The deal itself is a really promising one. There’s a 10-year agreement there, and the aspirations are to make ourselves the first fully sustainable team across the Premiership, both men and women. Our vision for doing that is that the first five years will be trying to build a commercially viable team that can stand on its own two feet.”
The ambition of sustainability is a bold step forward for a club that has endured an extraordinarily turbulent four months.
In early October, Warriors Women were banned from playing by the RFU after the club went into administration and WRFC Trading Ltd was wound up. The RFU gave permission for them to continue playing later that month, however their place in the Premier 15s was only fully confirmed with Cube’s interim acquisition in November, securing them for the remainder of this season.
Then in December, the RFU confirmed eight clubs had been offered a place in the Premier 15s competition from the 2023-24 season following a tender process. Warriors Women, who sit fifth in the league table, was one of four current sides left without an offer.
Reflecting on this latest setback Payne recognised that Worcester’s bid simply wasn’t strong enough at the time, but that this deal shows the clubs capabilities going forward.
He said: “Realistically we didn’t have everything in place to meet the requirements the RFU were looking for first time around. Unfortunately due to the O’Toole consortium being unable to agree terms with the RFU at this time, not necessarily any fault of theirs, but there was a knock-on impact to what we put forward in our bid.
“We recognise that, and actually we feel we’ve put the appropriate steps in place that we actually far surpass the requirements the RFU are looking for and are really hopeful they’ll look favourably on us now. We’re kind of waiting in the wings with our hand up going ‘come and get us, we’re ready to go, we want to be Worcester’s team again’.”
With Worcester Warriors men’s side still undergoing an administration process, Payne said that this partnership offered a chance to forge a new relationship, formally splitting the two sides.
He said: “From our perspective, we felt now was time to take back a bit of control of our own destiny. So what we’ve looked to do is separate the businesses.
“We’re keen to continue a strong partnership with the men’s programme, whoever may be the stewards behind that. But for the time being we are very much looking to the women’s team as its own independent entity, and its gives us the opportunity to really focus on the team, from a commercial and marketing perspective but also from a funding perspective.
“We can make sure our efforts are diverted towards sitting in that top four and hopefully challenging for the Premiership moving forward.”
While financial security is central to this deal, Payne was keen to emphasise that it extends beyond a simple funding arrangement.
He said: “With the support of Cube, who’s aim they say themselves in their own branding is to re-imagine sport and how things are done, we’re really excited to use that as part of Warriors Women as well and hopefully disturb the market.
“To be quite frank about it, the way the team is marketed and promoted moving forward needs to take a stark difference to the traditional rugby style we’ve had in the past.
“The current climate we’re in, people have a quick interest in something, they want instant access and gratification on their phone, they want to see what’s happening, they want to feel engaged, and they want to know the individuals.
“So we need to look at that different approach and we need to really kick on and move ourselves into the 21stcentury, not just as a team but as a sport as well.”
While Payne’s well-articulated vision is a hugely exciting prospect, securing their spot in next seasons Premier 15s is the priority if this is to be realised. The RFU have yet to confirm exactly what that process will look like for Worcester, but Payne says he is confident and that Worcester are ready to go.
He said: “The predominant message we’ve put across [to the RFU] is that we’re still in this. Our intention is not to leave the Premiership now, we have the resources, the tools and clearly the competitiveness that it takes to be in this Premiership.
“They are very aware that we are doing a lot of good things, and this is without going into future aspirations, things we’re doing right now really put us in strong contention for a place in that Premiership.”
This process will be absolutely critical to Worcester’s future. Without top-flight rugby Payne says their funding will be reduced significantly.
Asked if the RFU have provided a timeline, Payne said he’s received nothing definite, affirming that he wants the governing bodies to act quickly.
He said: “Teams need to make decisions and need to start making decisions and planning for the future. We’re not looking for this to go on for a month or two at best.
“We need to start seeing action from the RFU, from Premier 15s and let us kick on and really take control yet again of the future destiny of this team and the league.”
Four months on from disaster, Payne has headed a remarkable turnaround in the clubs fortunes. However, not only does he think Worcester can survive their troubles, he firmly believes they will thrive under this new partnership.
“The bit that always come back to me is, God, everyone loves an underdog story. That’s been Worcester Warriors so many times, its actually become a trademark of the Warriors brand really”, he said.
“I’m really confident [we can secure a Premier 15s place]. I know what we do here. There’s so much excitement and promise for the future of Warriors Women.
“What a story it would be that an independent franchise has come in with a different way of doing things and to be able to create a model that other teams look back on in 5-10 years and say ‘we need to do what Warriors Women did’.”
This is just the first page in Warriors Women’s new chapter. With the vision for the club’s future and the confirmation of new commercial opportunities coming in the next few weeks, this announcement marks the beginning of something potentially special.
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