NEGOTIATING for game venues, payment agreement and logistics has been an eye-opening experience for the Fiji Rugby Union as they step into the world of tier one rugby.
This was according to FRU Board chairman John Sanday while briefly sharing the agreements made with the rugby unions of Wales, England and Scotland regarding their home game venues come the Nations Championship in July.
The FIJI Water Flying Fijians is set to play Wales at Cardiff City Stadium on July, England at Hill Dickinson Stadium on July 11 and Scotland at Murrayfield Stadium on July 18.
“There are some expenses that we’ll have to pay for and there are some commercial arrangements. It’s all commercial at the moment; I have to say that the negotiation has been very much commercial.
“In fact, its confronting but its a good learning curve for us as we now understand how tier one nations organise their matches to generate the kind of revenues that can fund their development and how they approach it,” Sanday said.
There were also talks over costs and returns on revenue through ticket prices (gate takings).
“There is a formular that we have agreed to some of the host stadiums that we have to pay. We have to pay some other fees; there are some additional coasts on top of that so that’s all been ironed out.
“. It’s probably the reason why things were delayed a bit because we were just trying to reconfigure the numbers and we have now come to a point where the numbers look really good and we should, assuming things work to plan, we should come out with a good financial outcome,” Sanday added.
Tickets for the games against Wales will be on sale soon with packages aimed at attracting families.
“It’s a smaller stadium with a capacity of 32,500, the average ticket prices wil attract families, children to come and after all the costs, we will still make a reasonably good money. The ticket prices have been set to attract families because it’s the school holidays as well over there.”
