The Sunday Times reports July 09, 2006

Like Sale, Scotland can have a pro side attracting 10,000 that pays its way
MARK PALMER
Brian Kennedy, Sale's mastermind who was once snubbed by the SRU, says professional sides can still work here

::nobreak::Brian Kennedy slings out a laugh that threatens to set the windows rattling in a backroom of his office, tucked away down a quiet lane in even quieter Wilmslow. Just as well there is no shortage of glazers on the premises. The 46-year-old Edinburgh-born owner of Sale Sharks, who is worth £250m as co-holder of a portfolio of glass and kitchen concerns, has just acknowledged the irony in his trying to patch up a company unravelling under £23m of debt: it is the same figure that is crippling Murrayfield.

The timing is delicious. We are here to pick over the bones of a different body whose balance sheet is identically lopsided; for whom he is charged with contriving a future after being denied the chance to help circumvent the many potholes of its recent past.

The blueprint no longer comes stapled to a cheque, but Kennedy is now doing for the Scottish Rugby Union (SRU) what he asked, unsuccessfully, to be allowed to do some seven years ago. In late 1999, had Kennedy had his way, Murrayfield would have woken up to professionalism, well, professionally, instead of sticking a collective head under the covers and tightening the grip of central control.

With Kennedy’s wallet as a foundation stone, deals had been struck with the RFU, “virtually all the Scottish international players” and London Scottish to move the Richmond club to Edinburgh and join the English Premiership. The plan would have solved two of the SRU’s recurring problems, exposing the national team to a genuinely competitive environment (something the Celtic League still cannot claim to be), and removing financial responsibility for their upkeep.

Having started out down the district route, though, the union, most obviously in the rigid shape of Jim Telfer (then director of rugby) were not for turning. The most galling aspect of the car crash that has ensued is its preventability.

“Oh, don’t go on about that, it breaks my heart,” Kennedy flinches. “If it had been given the chance to happen, we’d have had Leicester, Wasps, Bath up in Edinburgh every second week. We’d have been getting 25,000 at games every time. We wouldn’t be where we are now. You shake your head, but it’s gone.”

Thankfully, Kennedy is not. One of the many distress flares that shot out in the aftermath of the SRU’s management clearout in January 2005 went all the way to Cheshire, in the form of a call from interim chief executive Fred McLeod requesting that Kennedy join the newly-formed Scottish rugby board as a non-executive director. “I’m Scottish — of course I accepted,” he says.

Kennedy has moved on since 1999, but Murrayfield has not and his role has grown in significance since April, when Gordon McKie, the current chief executive, conceded that only third party investment could ensure the continued existence of all three professional teams.

Kennedy has been called upon to once again present his model for success, only this time it reads as a résumé rather than a proposal. For this is the man who, in barely six years, has taken the Sharks from the brink of bankruptcy to breaking even; from relegation fodder to Premiership champions; from crowds of barely 1,000 to 10,000 sell-outs.

He recently sat the SRU board in front of a DVD that charts the Sharks’ passage from choppy to treasure-filled waters, a video nasty for those like president Andy Irvine who despaired of Murrayfield’s pig-headedness at the time of Kennedy’s initial submissions. “You should have seen them; they were salivating at the screen,” laughs the latter. “We [Sale] have built exactly what Scotland needs, and they’re looking at what we’ve done as a business and a rugby club, saying, ‘right, that’s what we’ll do’. They’re right; Scotland needs a Sale Sharks in Edinburgh, Glasgow, the Borders or elsewhere.”

The presentation intersperses action from May’s Premiership final and last year’s European Challenge Cup title with hospitality revenues rising 400% and merchandising up 625% between 2000 and 2005 (interestingly, only Jason Robinson and Charlie Hodgson’s names are requested more on replica shirts than Jason White’s). Kennedy would have been within his rights to show the film as an example of what the SRU could have won, but prefers to accentuate that all is not yet lost.

His repeated refrain that a Sale should be created here is quite deliberate in its terms of reference. It should happen because it can happen, he insists. Indeed, there are convincing similarities in the problems he has known, and solved, in the north-west, and the bugbears of the Scottish game.

There were the difficulties creating a fanbase against an almost uniformly footballing backdrop. Sale expect to sell at least 8,000 season tickets for the coming campaign. There was the issue of how to convince quality coaching and playing talent to commit to what was going to be a long climb. Sale now have the man, Philippe Saint-Andre, that France may want as their next leader, while their Premiership-winning 22 contained 15 full internationals. There was also the need to build a community as stirred as the team.

“That was the really difficult bit,” admits Kennedy. “At the start, the local clubs hated Sale, they saw us as competitors. We had to cut across all that and build bridges. The biggest kick I got from the Premiership final was looking at the 20,000 fans who had travelled to Twickenham and realising we’d built something tangible. Most of the guys were from the same clubs, and they were now wearing Sale shirts, thinking ‘this team represents us; we are the best.’

“I think it could be as big as that in Scotland, I really do. If you can work on the facilities, players and community like we have, in three or four years you can definitely have a side that attracts 10,000 people and pays its own way. How do you get that? Good central management and entrepreneurial flair. We’ve got the first part now, with Gordon McKie. I like the fact he’s aggressive, not some yellow-bellied wimp who smiles sweetly for the press while he screws up Scottish rugby.

“But we need someone else to step forward, someone with balls, ability and finances. Will that be Mr [Graham] Burgess? Will that be Brian Simmers? Only time will tell. I’ve met both and made it clear they’ve got to be able to write a cheque. If they can’t, they’re dreaming. Also, if you’re coming into this to make money, you’ve failed from the start. But if you want to get involved and build something for a community that will hopefully last forever, then come forward and do it. It’s waiting to be done.”

All that’s missing, it seems, although Burgess and partner Roy Carver would beg to differ, is a Brian Kennedy, a man whose wealth is plentiful enough to allow him to indulge a passion without needing to hover by the till. While Sale is only a “tiny little bit” of his life he has chosen to spend some £14m on it, although he has indicated that the lock will shortly go back on the safe now that the club has hinted it can be self-sufficient.

It has been fortunate to be able to call upon such an avid yet judicious backer, who says the significant rugby autonomy he gives Saint-Andre and sidekick Kingsley Jones is merely an extension of the leadership style that has proved so profitable in the rest of his realm.

“Let people do their jobs; help, but don’t replace them,” he says. “It’s exactly the same at Sale — why the hell should I have an input against the ex-captains of Wales and France? They know rugby inside out and back to front. I can kid on I understand what they talk about, but deep down I don’t have a clue. So why the hell would I try to impose my views on them? owners like Vladimir Romanov live on tenterhooks, changing all the time. I couldn’t operate like that.”

Kennedy doesn’t have issues with the colour of the Lithuanian’s money, just the colour of his scarf. He used to infuriate his Hearts-supporting head teacher at Tynecastle High School by wearing Hibs colours to lessons, and several years ago had agreed a deal to buy the club before Sir Tom Farmer changed his mind.

Kennedy likes to be different, but even he wasn’t going to take up rugby in Gorgie, where he started out earning £1 a week cleaning windows with his father. He sampled playing at the age of 29, six years after moving to Manchester, and has been convinced to return to the Wilmslow back row next year after featuring only once last season. He just can’t help pushing himself.

“People ask me why that is, and I answer that it’s the fear of failure, fear of any of these businesses failing,” he admits. “It’s not the money that motivates me, but reputation, pride, dignity. Initially your drive is to get stability, then you strive for success and recognition. It doesn’t mean anything, it’s not tangible, but we all want it. I have that fear of failure because I want to preserve the recognition that I have now.”

If only Scottish rugby had opened its eyes sooner.

This article was posted on 9-Jul-2006, 15:08 by Hugh Barrow.