Rob Baxter has done more than enough for Exeter over the years to deserve a vote of confidence in tough times, and now he has one. Despite six consecutive defeats in the Premier League, his boss is confident.
Chairman Tony Rowe’s message to concerned Chiefs supporters is; don’t panic. A shock loss at Newcastle last Friday night really raised the alarm and increased fears of a spiraling crisis in Devon, but Rowe is confident financial fortunes are improving and a revival on the pitch will follow.
Exeter are the only winless club in the top division this season and in their last outing they were an error-strewn rabble at Kingston Park. Despite all the golden mentions on his CV, rugby director Baxter admitted on Thursday that he rightly feels the pressure.
But Rowe is steadfast in his support for a man he has had to spend so many years warning the RFU not to try to poach, to take charge of England. “I have a very good group of coaches, led by Rob,” he told Mail Sport.
“He and I have been working together since I first got involved in the club in 1993, so we go a long way back. I’m confident, there’s no doubt about that. If you look at the young group of players they have there, they have a tremendous amount of talent – almost more talent now than we had eight or nine years ago. They just have to remember the coaching for 80 minutes!’
Exeter Chiefs star Ethan Roots looks dejected as his team has now lost six Premiership games in a row
Exeter’s director of rugby Rob Baxter (pictured) knows he is under pressure
Rowe was at Kingston Park last Friday evening to witness first-hand a performance that must have represented one of the low points of his long association with Exeter. He is confident that the experience will serve a purpose in the long run.
“We held our own in the first half but Newcastle are a tough place anyway and Mr Diamond coaches them,” Rowe said. ‘We just did stupid things. If you keep giving the ball away, you can’t do anything. The players will learn from that, I can tell you. I was in the locker room afterwards and those guys learned a big lesson.”
The Chiefs were in transition mode, following a mass exodus that saw Jack Nowell and the Simmonds brothers – Joe and Sam – move to France, while Luke Cowan-Dickie, Jonny Hill and Tom O’Flaherty moved north to Sale. They were all key figures in the golden era, which peaked exactly four years ago when Exeter won the 2020 Premiership Final to complete a historic league and Champions Cup double.
Baxter had to rebuild by promoting young talent, as he had done to such telling effect almost a decade earlier. “We actually got a lot of young guys from our academy together eight or nine years ago and we had a very successful team,” Rowe said.
“The problem was that they… they hadn’t quite reached their expiration date, but when we talked about this gladiatorial sport, they were becoming old men – and expensive old men. With the salary cap being lowered and various other things, we just couldn’t afford that.
Exeter won the Champions Cup four years ago to mark a golden era at the club
They also lifted the Premiership trophy, completing a historic double, but things have gone downhill since then
“What Rob and his coaches have done is put together another bunch of young lads and some of the individuals are fantastic, but it’s about them working together as a team for 80 minutes. They’ll get there, it’s just frustrating for the coaches at the moment and sometimes you just sit there thinking, “Why did they do that?”. But I have every confidence in it. There are some really talented young men in there and the penny will drop. You can’t force it.
‘Lack of experience and a bit of game naivety, that’s what it was all about. They will get it. It’s coming. I don’t worry about it. We had the same thing eight or nine years ago, as we developed the team earlier. I’m sure the fans know and will understand rugby.”
There is no doubt that Exeter have missed the reassuring presence of Henry Slade so far this season – ahead of his expected comeback against Harlequins at Sandy Park on Sunday. Baxter also believes that some members of his squad have not ‘rolled up their sleeves’ and embraced the hard work required to take the next step after an encouraging campaign with a squad full of rookie potential last season.
But that team is thin in some places. The Chiefs operate with more limited resources. Money is a contributing factor to this. When asked if a reduced budget has had a major impact, Baxter said: “Without a doubt. We spent a little more this year than last year, but we are miles away from the salary cap. There are budgetary issues, but we are a membership club and must be a profitable business. We cannot remain a loss-making company forever because that is illegal. Our accountants cannot say that we are a going concern, so we have to make decisions (about budgeting). We did that.
“Some of that is the cause of where we are now, but that’s not the whole problem. We have to develop faster as a group, as individuals and in the way we play than before.’
Chairman Tony Rowe (pictured) believes Covid and the recession have cost the club a lot of money, but backs Baxter to turn things around
Exeter will get a welcome boost with England star Henry Slade (pictured) back in their team this weekend as they look to kick-start their season
In theory, Baxter could enter the transfer market if necessary, in a bid to kick-start Exeter’s season late. “We have an amount of money that we could invest, for that player that we could need in an important area, if we thought, ‘This guy has the right experience to come in and make a difference,’” he said. Much has been made of the Chiefs’ apparent lack of composure and authority, so that could eventually become an area that management wants to strengthen.
Moving on, the plan is to increase spending on the playing staff, closer to the cap, which has been increased to the pre-pandemic level of £6.4m per year, plus various additional ‘credits’. If the club emerges from the crisis and avoids the unthinkable threat of relegation, the financial prospects will be brighter again.
“Covid, the recession and everything else has cost us £17m,” Rowe said. ‘It has been a challenge to keep the club together financially, but we are doing well. We have no one asking us for money and we have a budget to make a profit this year, provided we can stay within that budget.
‘I would be the first to admit that it has been very difficult. We really struggled at times over the last four years, but we got through it and our supporters and season ticket holders have stuck with us. Now we just have to get the team in the right place on the field. It sounds easy, doesn’t it?!”