Rob Baxter has been in charge of Exeter since 2009 [Getty Images]
Exeter director of rugby Rob Baxter has cautioned that any potential new investment in the club may require several years to produce tangible results on the pitch. Club members and shareholders have greenlit a bid from Cannae Holdings’ Black Knight Sports and Entertainment—the owners of Premier League side AFC Bournemouth—to assume control of the team.
The American investors will now engage in negotiations and initiate a due diligence process, which is not expected to conclude before the end of May. If finalized, this would mark the third major investment in a Premiership side this season. Newcastle was acquired by energy drink giant Red Bull in August, while billionaire industrialist Sir James Dyson became co-owner of Bath in March, following significant new capital injected into the champions.
“Some people are going ‘oh, there’s going to be investment so that means there’s immediate change,” Baxter told BBC Sport. “Newcastle will be able to understand, when you get significant investment it actually takes a little while for that to come through, because normally when you need significant investment what’s happened is you’ve under-invested for a few years. So getting that back online, like a really well-funded, well-invested-in academy, does take a couple of years to start to bring those players through.”
Baxter emphasized that long-term recruitment strategies also lag behind sudden cash injections. “It’s a little bit the same in your recruitment process. A recruitment process you really develop the strength in depth, like a Bath have got or like we had in the past—knowing you’re going to spend a salary cap for the foreseeable future for a number of seasons. Not knowing where your budget is for the next year until later in a season, you can’t do that.”
He expressed optimism about the club’s future if the deal proceeds. “If we had significant investment, I would think the future moving forward over the next three or four years would be fantastically bright for the club, because I know where we can invest to significantly improve things and we look pretty good now.”
Baxter identified several areas—club academy, pitches, training facilities at Sandy Park, and the senior playing squad—that could benefit from additional funding. Exeter boosted its spending last summer by recruiting Len Ikitau, Tom Hooper, and Andrea Zambonin. This has propelled a side that finished second-from-bottom last season into the top four with three rounds remaining, following Sunday’s win over champions Bath at Sandy Park.
However, with near-complete planning for next season, Baxter does not foresee any major surprises this summer. “We’ve moved to a certain level of salary cap where it’s not like we’ve just got this big pot of money we’ve just got to hold that back for one player,” he said. “We’ve started to front load some contracts already, now we’ve got a little bit of room in the cap. How you plan your squad going forward takes a little bit longer than that going, ‘oh, suddenly we’ve got some money, let’s go and spend it’, it doesn’t really work like that. I think you have to build your whole squad through to that level.”