Worcester administrators to urge RFU not to relegate club

The joint administrator of Worcester Warriors has revealed she will lobby the Rugby Football Union not to relegate them from the Premiership this season.

In an exclusive interview with Telegraph Sport following her appointment, Julie Palmer of Begbies Traynor also said she would seek an adjournment of a winding-up petition by HM Revenue & Customs that could otherwise see the arm of the club that pays their players liquidated next week.

Speaking after the company that owns Worcester, WRFC Trading Limited, asked the Government to put them into administration, Palmer admitted she and colleague Andrew Hook were in a race against time to find a buyer and stop Warriors going bust.

Prospective purchasers will want to know what division the club will be playing in next season, with administration a relegation offence under RFU rules.

However, such a punishment – which could be a deal-breaker for interested parties – could be averted if it can be proven an insolvency event was a no-fault situation caused by the coronavirus crisis.

Asked if she and Hook would lobby the RFU, which suspended Worcester from playing matches on Monday, not to relegate Warriors, she replied: “Certainly, we will do. But, I think, in the first instance, we’re hopeful that the RFU will be supportive of just keeping this in place as a temporary suspension anyway and not exercising the relegation clause until we both see a direction of travel.

“There is that sort of carve-out clause there that says if it’s Covid-related, that can be used as grounds to say that the club shouldn’t be relegated.”

‘I will ask them if they will agree to an adjournment’

As first revealed by Telegraph Sport, the Worcester crisis was triggered last month by a winding-up petition from HMRC against both WRFC Trading Limited and WRFC Players Ltd due to be heard in court next week.

Palmer said putting the former into administration had not staved off the winding-up threat to the latter and that she needed to have “urgent” conversations with HMRC.

She added: “Ideally, I’ll ask them if they’ll agree to an adjournment, because, if nothing else, that will give me a little bit more time to play with in terms of the players contracts being kept live, rather than terminating on a liquidation event.”

Any adjournment would only buy the club a matter of days while they remain suspended by the RFU, with Palmer saying she wanted a rescue deal in place before their scheduled home game against Harlequins a week on Saturday.

Warning that would depend on interested parties, she added: “Our message, though, is very clear: they need to engage quickly and they need to be in a position to move quickly and to be properly funded to move quickly.

“The more weeks that go by, the harder it is to reinsert Worcester back in as a playing Premiership club this season.”

‘Land might have been used as security to pay wages’

Refusing to comment on the number of bidders for the club or expressions of interest, she said: “As you might appreciate, with any sports club, there are a lot of people who express an interest and what we’re always keen to do is look at those expressions and decide on the ones that are credible that we can engage with.”

Palmer also confirmed any deal would include for Sixways, for which she said she and Hook had been appointed “fixed-charge receivers”, but not necessarily land around the stadium that has been subject of fiercely-denied accusations of asset-stripping by owners Colin Goldring and Jason Whittingham.

“There’s an entity called Worcester Sports Ltd that has a company called MQ Property Co,” Palmer said. “And, effectively, from what we know, the majority, if not all of the land, sits in that company. We have an interest in that company by way of a large share pledge over the shares in that company. We understand that some of the land might have been sold or used as security to pay the wages leading up to administration.

“I wouldn’t really want to say any more on that at the moment other than to say we know there are concerns raised in the press. But, until we conduct a full investigation, we couldn’t really comment on that in greater detail.

“Obviously, it’s something that interested parties will be keen to understand.”

It could also be a deal-breaker if the inclusion of the land in any takeover is blocked, including by Goldring and Whittingham.

“I’m a firm believer that if people initially try to find common ground and work on things on a co-operative, consensual basis, it delivers the best outcome for everybody,” Palmer said.

“If that’s not the case then I’ll look at the alternatives at that point but I’m trying to focus on positives at the moment.”

Palmer admitted players and staff could now go unpaid pending any takeover but added: “It may well be that an interested party says, actually, ‘I’m going to move into a funding position in advance of an acquisition’.”

Asked if she was confident the club would be saved, she replied: “Very difficult to say at the moment. I always live in hope and I’m a naturally positive person but, again, the message is, interested parties, they need to be funded and able to engage quickly to try to rescue this.”