Ahead of the Game: Yorkshire land financial boost from Castore deal

Yorkshire have agreed a multi-million pound kit deal with Castore in a major boost for the cash-strapped county. 

The five-year contract is the first significant commercial deal brought to the club since their leadership was overhauled following the return of Colin Graves as chairman in February.

Graves has yet to secure the £4m outside investment he promised after injecting £1m to ensure Yorkshire could complete the season earlier this year. 

But the Castore deal is a positive sign that the club remain attractive to major brands after several years that have been marred by in-fighting and the Azeem Rafiq racism scandal. 

The British sportswear company has become a major player in cricket since being launched by brothers Tom and Phil Beahon in 2016. 

Yorkshire will become the fifth county whose kits are made by Castore, which is also the official supplier of the England men’s and women’s teams and New Zealand’s national sides. 

Castore also partners with Everton, McLaren, Oracle Red Bull Racing and Adam Peaty, while Sir Andy Murray is a long-standing investor in the business. 

The Yorkshire deal is understood to give Castore control of the club shop at Headingley and their online retail arm in an arrangement similar to that being sought by former Newcastle owner Mike Ashley for his Slazenger brand 12 months ago. 

Castore has not secured naming rights for Headingley, which was on the table as part of Yorkshire’s negotiations with Ashley, with the club continuing to look elsewhere. 

Sporting Group International was appointed by Yorkshire to lead the search for a naming rights partner in June and that process is ongoing.

Yorkshire’s financial position remains challenging as they recorded a loss of £7.1m last year and have debts of around £23m to the Colin Graves Trust. 

They are in takeover talks with Indian Premier League franchise Sunrisers Hyderabad, but the members must endorse Graves’s proposal to demutualise for that deal to go ahead, with a ballot set to take place early next year.

FA shuns 2027 Champions League bid

The Football Association is not planning to bid to host the 2027 Champions League final at Wembley despite receiving considerable encouragement from Uefa to do so. 

A new tender process is set to be opened for the final after Italian football chiefs withdrew Milan’s San Siro stadium last week due to concerns that planned redevelopment work would not be completed in time.

Wembley has become Uefa’s favourite venue in recent years due to the high commercial returns it provides, with matches guaranteed to sell out and a 17,000 corporate hospitality offering. 

A Uefa source told City AM it would expect to make at least £5m more from the game if it was held in London rather than Milan. 

The national stadium hosted this year’s Champions League final between Real Madrid and Borussia Dortmund, as well as two finals in three years in 2011 and 2013, and the final of the 2021 European Championship.

The FA’s current focus is preparing to stage the 2028 European Championship, a tournament shared with the other Home Nations, so it is not anticipating bidding for the previous year’s Champions League final. 

With almost three years remaining Uefa will run a formal tender rather than simply nominating alternative hosts, a time-consuming and costly process that has deterred the FA.

Premiership clubs wooed by insolvency firm

An insolvency firm which last week published a damning report on the state of Premiership rugby’s finances has begun offering its services to some of the 10 top-flight clubs. 

The Leonard Curtis Rugby Finance Report, produced by sports finance academics and restructuring experts and with a foreword written by former England international James Haskell, concluded that seven of the clubs were balance-sheet insolvent and that only Leicester Tigers, Northampton Saints and Gloucester would be viable businesses without the backing of wealthy owners. 

The report was based on aggregating data from the clubs’ publicly available accounts which showed collective losses of £30.5m rather than any new information, so despite Haskell’s warning of a sport “heading for a precipice” there was little alarm at the Rugby Football Union or Premiership Rugby Limited. 

The fact that Leonard Curtis is now touting for business among the clubs may offer an insight into the reasons the report was commissioned. 

Refs offer VAR critics cold comfort

Referees’ body Professional Game Match Officials Ltd remains under siege from several top-flight clubs, with Nottingham Forest this week claiming that poor refereeing is “damaging clubs” and “failing the fans”, but the Premier League has been able to provide some good news to its unhappy members. 

Chief football officer Tony Scholes told the clubs last week that the average time taken for a VAR check has reduced from 64 seconds last season to just 25 in the current campaign, which has resulted in almost two minutes being shaved off the average match. 

VAR checks should be even quicker when a new system of semi-automatic offside detection is introduced later in the season, although that has been delayed due to teething problems with the new technology.