The Business of Rugby Union When the eight remaining teams take to the field next month for the quarter-finals of the Heineken Cup, Europe’s premier club rugby competition, no fewer than four of them will be French. By contrast, just one – Northampton Saints – will be from England. This represents a change in the balance of power between Europe’s two biggest rugby nations from a year earlier. Then, three quarter-finalists were English and only one French (though the trophy was lifted ultimately by Leinster of Ireland).
Attempts to explain the current strength of French club rugby often focus on a recent exodus across the Channel of top English talent. In the past year or so, a clutch of big names, headed by Jonny Wilkinson, England’s World Cup-winning fly-half, and international teammate James Haskell, have headed south to join clubs in the Top 14 Orange, the leading French league.
