Report: Exeter primed for takeover as US investors want in

Exeter Chiefs are poised to become the next Gallagher PREM club to change hands after agreeing a deal with a wealthy American backer to take control, subject to a vote from their membership next month.

The Guardian is reporting that an extraordinary general meeting will be held on 7 May, and the club’s 700 members will be urged to back the sale, ending a long search by chief executive Tony Rowe, who said he can’t continue to fund the club.

If the sale goes ahead, the Chiefs will become the third club this season to attract new investment after Austrian energy drinks giants Red Bull bought Newcastle Falcons and Sir James Dyson hoovered up a 50 per cent stake in Bath.

Rowe has been the Chiefs’ main money man for over 30 years and has reported that the unnamed backer was waiting on ring-fencing the PREM before pressing ahead with a deal to buy the member-owned Chiefs.

“The proposal is for the members to accept. At the moment, I can’t discuss what that proposal is in any shape or form, other than it is an American investor. They want to get involved in English rugby,” Rowe told The Guardian.

At the start of the year, the Chiefs posted an after-tax loss of £10.3m for last season, when they finished ninth in the PREM and crashed out of the Champions Cup after losing all four of their pool games.

Chiefs director of rugby Rob Baxter, who sits on the nine-member board of Exeter Rugby Group PLC, recently told RugbyPass that a natural affinity for the area from new investors isn’t as important as being in it for the long haul.

“I don’t think they have to have a natural affinity to the club and to the area because that’s a little bit like saying, how does Tom Hooper come in and play well, with absolutely no affinity to Devon and the club or the country?

“So, I think what I would like, what you’d like to see, is someone who comes in for it to be a long-term project and says, right, what I’m looking for is success, and I’m prepared to commit to that for a longish term period.

“And I want to be involved with a successful rugby club that potentially can win trophies or be at the right end of the game in the future, and develop the community game in the area.

“That’s the bigger picture and where they come from, I think, is a little bit irrelevant if they’re prepared to buy into that longer-term vision. I think that’s the important thing,” he said.