Rob Baxter gives a positive update on Henry Slade's future

Exeter Chiefs boss Rob Baxter admits that the club are closing in on agreeing a new deal with England centre Henry Slade, who is out of contract at the end of the season.

Plymouth-born Slade, 32, is one of England’s players who is on an enhanced player squad contract and is closing in on his 250th appearance for the Chiefs, a milestone he could reach against Saracens later this month.

Baxter says that talks with Slade, who only played one of England’s four games in the Autumn Nations Series against Argentina two weeks ago, have been productive, and he expects a successful outcome in the next few weeks.

And he says that he was always confident of retaining Slade despite the lure of R360 in the background, which, for the time being, has been removed, with the start date of the rebel league put back until 2028.

“Henry is very settled here, and I don’t think every decision is purely about money. I’d be surprised if Henry left. We are a little way down the line in discussing this. Hopefully, we will be getting things sorted shortly,” he said.

“It (R360) wasn’t something I was unduly concerned about, if I’m honest with you, and from my perspective at the Exeter Chiefs. We want the best players playing in England for English clubs.

“Keeping our competition as strong as possible and it’s positive news for us as a Premiership club playing in the Premiership is all I can say about it.

“I’ll be honest, the majority of us involved in the sport to a relatively high level were getting the feeling from more than one source that it was going to be a struggle for them to take off now.

“A lot of us had that expectation for a couple of months, so it probably didn’t come into our planning as much as some think it did.”