Peter Jackson: Money to talk clubs out of Europe?

The chief executives of the Six Nations renewed talks in London yesterday aimed at finalising an offer designed to change the face of the game. Having already forked out some €400m to buy stakes in the English Premiership and PRO14, the private equity firm CVC Partners are willing to pay the Six Nations almost as much again for a share of the tournament’s commercial rights.

As everyone knows by now, money has not so much talked in what used to be the amateur code as shrieked. The new backers see the game as providing the potential to generate the same kind of rich pickings they found in revitalising Formula One.