Ireland have no plans to play 6N in US

IRELAND say there are “currently no plans or discussions” about playing a Six Nations match in the United States.

World Rugby‘s chief executive Alan Gilpin said this week that the global governing body would assist any nation that wants to switch a Six Nations match to the US in its drive to spread the game stateside.

Gilpin suggested an Ireland vs Italy match would appeal to expatriate fans in the US but in a statement issued on Friday, the IRFU dismissed the idea that it was considering moving any fixtures to the US.

“The United States is an important growth market for rugby and we welcome and embrace initiatives that help introduce the sport to new audiences and, crucially, generate new revenues for the game,” said an IRFU spokesperson. “There are currently no plans or discussions, from an IRFU perspective, regarding Six Nations matches being played in the United States.

“We believe the Six Nations holds a special place for supporters across all participating unions, and the opportunity for fans in Ireland and Italy to support their teams at home remains a central part of the competition’s appeal.”

The US will stage the 2031 World Cup and World Rugby want to raise the sport’s profile by staging more high-profile matches Stateside. Baltimore hosted the fourth Test between South Africa and New Zealand last night.

Chief: Alan Gilpin

England have effectively ruled themselves out of moving a Six Nations game across the Atlantic on the grounds that fixtures at Twickenham are too lucrative. They can generate around £10m from a Six Nations home match and men’s fixtures at Twickenham account for about 85 per cent of the RFU‘s revenues.

If other unions want to try it, the Six Nations committee would have to agree as would the tournament broadcasters.

“In terms of matchday economics, South Africa v New Zealand is like a Six Nations match,” Gilpin told the Telegraph. “It starts to show that [financial return] is not the barrier. If there is the appetite to take some of these big matches in the future to the US, we can now.

“We completely understand the need for rugby to continue to drive more economic sustainability. Any of those unions [could] go and look at a match that they would have had at home and say, ‘Right, can I at least match, if not better my own economics by partnering with World Rugby and taking that match to the US?’”

New Zealand have been at the forefront of rugby’s attempts to make an imprint stateside. Ireland beat the All Blacks for the first time when the teams met in front of 60,000 at Soldier Field in Chicago in 2016, and last year’s rematch was also a commercial success.

Gilpin said the history of the Six Nations and its ability to connect with expats in the US could help crack the market. He added: “This isn’t a live discussion of an Italy vs Ireland game, but why we use that as an example is because you’ve got two fantastic fanbases in the US of Irish and Italian fans. If you could take a Six Nations game to the right place, to a Boston or to a New York, where there’s a lot of those fanbases, you can definitely drive the economics.

“Now, you’re going to have Irish fans and Italian fans in those respective home countries saying, ‘Hang on a minute, we want to see our country play?’ The counter-argument to that [is] it’s still Irish and Italian fans getting the chance to watch their team, so they’re just not the ones who live in Ireland and Italy on this occasion. But that’s a balancing piece we’ve got to work through.”