They mean business.
It’s safe to say that most rugby fans are against the proposed R360 league, which is aiming to launch in 2026 with eight men’s teams and four women’s.
The breakaway league will be similar to golf’s LIV; global, with franchises and a condensed season, backed by wealthy patrons.
Just as Greg Norman was the face of LIV at its inception, former England centre Mike Tindall is in a similar role for R360.
And he has gone after some of the biggest names in the sport to promote it, with Brian O’Driscoll revealing that he was approached.
The Ireland legend said: “Mike Tindall asked me to sign an NDA about a year ago to find out more about it before it came out, and I just actually never did.
“And so I don’t know the pitch from their side and so I’m just kind of reading what everyone else has read rather than knowing from within.
“But it’s not gone away, which many of these things have. We’ll have to wait and see. I’ve seen Tindall a bit and he feels as though there’s massive scope in it.”
For fans, there will be no history or pedigree behind the new franchises, and thus no emotional attachment.
This has been the biggest challenge for LIV Golf when competing with the PGA Tour, but the Saudi-backed league showed that, above everything else, it is money that matters.
For those opposed to the new teams and league, O’Driscoll’s comments will be a stark reminder that “deep pockets” talk.
He continued: “You hear the different noise and it’s just this hasn’t gone away, and there’s apparently deep pockets.
“It’s just trying to take a leap around how does this work – how do you create an environment that’s not just about paying the top people the top money? How do you get support? How do you get interest levels?
“There will be huge scepticism until it’s tried, but there’s all sorts of NDAs apparently at play, and ex-England players have verbally agreed and so on. But it’s all ‘he said, she said’ at the moment. It’s just maybe it’s to do with my capacity to see that change, but it just feels like there’s lots of elements that are pulling against it.
“I don’t know whether clubs will want their international players doing that – it takes away from the club scene here, but it also relieves some of the pressure for the national set-up. It’s really hard to know.”
