The professional era: Part 1

Since England became the first team to turn fully professional, contracting at the top end of women’s rugby has become commonplace.

But what is the impact on a deeper system of players when just a handful at the top are being paid? How do players balance the expectation of performance that comes alongside payment for the first time, and what is the reality for players who are taking home tiny sums of money but who have been forced to give up or cut back on their careers?

In this three part series, we look at New Zealand, Australia, England, Canada and England and explore the differing experiences there, how each system is rolling out payment and how this system could work better for players. 

We spoke to players and coaches across these systems to get a better understanding of what works, what doesn’t and what the player experience is really like at the heart of a sport which is building a new, more professional era. 

What happens where?

Each country we looked at deploys a different system of “professionalism”, with some adopting central contracts, and others operating a pay per selection policy. 

So let’s first look at the overall picture in each country. 

New Zealand 

• New Zealand has a five tiered structure of retainer rates for Black Ferns. Ranging from the entry rate of $50,000 per annum through to $70,000 for top tier athletes
• Since 2023, the original eight tier system has been reduced to five. Players aged under 25 cannot earn more than the entry level retainer of $50,000.
• On top of retainers, players are paid assembly fees for camps and tours. If they are unavailable due to injury, they earn 80% of this rate.
• Finally, contracted Black Ferns are entitled to a share of the Black Ferns Legacy fund which is $150,000 per annum and a share of $450,000 per annum based on their Promotional Service hours
• Outside of those on retainers, players may join the Black Ferns as an interim cover due to certain circumstances such as injury. They are paid a retainer of $750 per week for time they are required plus assembly fees. 
• Players in Black Ferns development teams are paid $1250 per week (pro rata for part weeks).
• Outside of the Black Ferns, all Super Rugby Aupiki players are paid a flat rate of $17,000 for a season.
• Farah Palmer Cup players are still amateur unlike their male counterparts in the National Provincial Championship. Flights and accommodation are covered but conservative estimates are that it costs players around $2000 a season to play.

Australia

Wallaroos are offered contracts in a three tier system:

• Tier one offers a base retainer of $52,000* + assembly fees. This can add up to a maximum of around $75,000 but players need to be available for every camp and tour to earn this.
• Tier two is a base retainer of $30,000* + assembly fee
• Tier three offers players assembly fees only
• Outside of the Wallaroos, Super W players earn $4000

* Must play in Super W to receive the retainer

England 

• England players on central contracts can earn up to £47,000
• Clubs in PWR also pay players, with each club governed by an overall £190,000 salary cap which will rise to £220,000 next season
• England players make differing sums depending on their central contract amount and the amount their club offers them with some top players topping their central contracts up by almost £25,000 
• Most club players however are on much less and will often work part time. They can be on contracts worth anything from £2,000 - £10,000 on average. 

Canada 

• Canada have individual player agreements rather than contracts
• These agreements cover flights, accommodation and per diem in camp.
• Canada players are paid assembly fees and match fees. The rate of these fees essentially covers costs for players. 
• There is no injury cover. If you’re not called up, you’re not paid. 
• Outside of this, all sides are pay to play. This includes the Canadian U20 and U18 sides.

When comparing the different models across certain outside influences becomes apparent.

For example, the 80% rate for injury cover written into Black Ferns contracts is no doubt inspired by the same rate which is paid out to injured workers via New Zealand’s no-fault accidental injury compensation scheme.

The tier system itself also appears to have transitioned across from sevens as it mimics the pay structure offered to those national teams. Whereas New Zealand men’s fifteens contracts adopt more of the English model. With earning potential tied to salary caps and discretion offered within their distribution. 

Australia, for their part, appears to have taken cues from the New Zealand model as there is alignment between the two.

But this may also be due to their sevens programme professionalising first. The requirement for players to participate in the Super W in order to receive a retainer is novel and perhaps speaks to the real pressure they face from other codes and countries to hold on to talent in their player pool.

There are other nations, who are taking their steps into professionalism and the establishment of their own domestic league, who may look to replicate this requirement. 

Canada’s model would appear familiar to many players who participated in international rugby prior to the introduction of central contracts.

Their programme is essentially cost neutral to their union at this stage due to long term sponsorship agreements. One point that is worth stressing within their approach is the move to professionalise support staff first. It’s only recently that their coach and physio was brought on full time, along with their analyst that they currently share with their sevens programme. 

England had the advantage of ‘going first’ and so began, with a top down approach before easing into a hybrid and more traditional country and club model. England also invest heavily into their coaching staff, with more fulltime professional backroom team members than any other side and more freedom for clubs to manoeuvre payments within a salary cap. 

The transition to professionalism

Though England became the first country to officially contract their players in 2019, payment in women’s rugby has been around long before this, with ad-hoc deals and agreements for major tournaments in existence long before. 

The advent of a new era however has brought more structured central contracts for top players of a handful of nations, plus payment for club and representative competitions below the national team.

The impact on players was not immediate, explains former Black Fern Chelsea Semple. 

“When we first became part time, and we got our first contracts, not much changed. I think the only thing that changed was they could say, ‘you're being paid now so you've got to meet these standards’ but those players who made the World Cup team were hitting those anyway.

“It wasn't until very recently that there were more resources available and we definitely started becoming better rugby players. You could see it on the field, the body shapes and fitness level and  the skill level. The Aupiki competition this year was outstanding and that comes down to girls doing rugby all day.”

New Zealand, like England, are able to give larger numbers of players contracts, but in Australia, the volume is lower and Emily Chancellor says that the balance is still playing out. 

“The way our tiers are structured means that there are girls that are going on tour that are not in tier one so you might have half the players in a national team camp on completely different contracts which means a lot of players on a given tour are not earning enough money to survive. They're the ones that are actually taking the time off work, or study to be there so we do have that disparity still.”

In Canada, where players do not receive central contracts but rather are paid per camp, front rower Emily Tuttosi believes in many ways the system works better.

“I find that in our environment everyone is pretty professional - because everyone is balancing something, the training does come with that extra bit of purpose. 

“I'm not saying that being paid more would be bad but again everyone's there and everyone wants everyone there because we want to be the best team and it’s nothing to do with having to keep a contract or anything. We're just fighting for shirts on the pitch and then off the pitch we’re like how can we make Canadian rugby better?

“If you have the attitude and the mindset and the skills to fit in a paycheck it’s nice. But I think it's probably way more overwhelming if you come into a contracted environment and then think Holy fuck, what the hell am I doing here?”

Semple agrees that sometimes a contract brings extra pressure on a player, especially because of the short lived nature of many of them. 

“I look back on my career and I played some of my best rugby in 2015, 2016, for no money at all. I was still studying or working full time and just making it work. Then when all the resources come, I guess that helps everyone who might not be as motivated. That helps everyone kind of get on the same page because you've got the full time training, the full time nutritionist and physio and all of that. 

“But it's an attitude thing for me, you've got to want to be professional. Because there's some paid people who are meant to be professional but their behaviours are not professional. We are still at the start of this journey as far as I am concerned.”

Disparities within the system. 

With players on vastly different salaries and contract amounts, disparities are evident in any given squad. 

In England, where top players can earn decent salaries by combining their central contracts with club payments, there is a race to sign Red Roses to stay alive in the competitive PWR, but that means even less money for players who can only be given a club contract. 

Jo Brown, who has been capped for Ireland, played at Worcester and is now at Sale Sharks,  explains the challenge.

“The league is hugely competitive and the clubs who can bring in a lot of international players are going to surge ahead. I am working as a physio in the NHS currently and am part time with a small contract at Sale - enough to buy rugby kit and pay for petrol. I was actually earning more when I was a student but I’ve been around long enough to know that trying to train like a professional when you’re juggling work is incredibly tough. You start to feel like the game slips away from you and you start to get sick all the time.”

In New Zealand, Semple also sees the issue playing out. 

“There's this huge disparity even between the hubs we have here and that's not any of the girl's fault. It comes down to who you've got in your hub, who has that professional mindset, who's had that experience. For example, in our Waikato hub, for the last couple of years, we've had Ruby Tui in there.

"She's been a high performance professional in the sevens environment for so long, that she knew what we had to do in our hub to really reach our peak performance environments. So she brought all of that experience with her, which meant we're one of the top operating hubs because we set the standards with her..”

“The thing that doesn't sit right with me with all of this though is that we have 30 to 40 full time contracted athletes here in New Zealand. That's 30 to 40 girls, in our whole country with 1000s of girls playing rugby, that are professional. And the gap is widening. 

“I wish there was a way that we could really bridge that gap to other girls. Because if there’s 35 girls contracted, well, what about the 36th best player in New Zealand? 

Chancellor agrees that the nature of ‘who gets what’ adds a layer of challenge.

“I've seen a change in the way the girls are treating themselves which is amazing. But some girls don't know what and how fulltime is  supposed to look. What does good training then look like? What does being an almost full time athlete, if you're not going to work look like? How are you now using your time through your day?  

How do you take it on and make it practical when you've got eight athletes that are full time because they're not doing anything else? And then you've got 15 who are still doing full time work and trying to balance it? It's actually just the nuances within our programme and then working out how and who we invest in that we need to be thinking about.”

Where to from here?

This is a snapshot of our game's first tentative steps towards professionalism. Each has walked a slightly different path, carved out by financial realities, cultural considerations and competing ambitions. The rapid pace of this rollout has left little time to reflect on the impact of these pay cheques to those receiving them.

 For our next part in this series, we will examine some of those consequences. Looking at emerging challenges for the players and their programmes.

And the all important potential that is still there to play for.