Sports Teams Suffer Major Financial Blow

The Guardian

Canterbury's collapse leaves kitless clubs in a quandary• Portsmouth, Leinster and the Scottish football team all affected
• Pompey due to launch new kit on Tuesday

Owen Gibson The Guardian, Wednesday 15 July 2009

The Heineken Cup champions Leinster had signed a new two-year kit deal with Canterbury nine months ago. Photograph: Paul Harding/Action Images

Rival sportswear firms have wasted no time in making overtures to the wide range of rugby, football and cricket clubs affected by the collapse of Canterbury Europe, plunged into administration on Monday with the loss of 72 jobs. All of its contracts were summarily cancelled. Portsmouth – currently in limbo as they await a new owner with no permanent manager, no new players and now no kit supplier – will be among those affected, along with the Scottish Rugby Union and Heineken Cup holders Leinster. All were in the first or second year of new deals running until 2012 and worth up to £1m a year. The affected clubs, also including London Wasps, Cardiff Blues and Yorkshire County Cricket Club, will be treated as unsecured creditors.

The SRU was forced to cancel the planned launch yesterday of an alternative Scotland kit, while Portsmouth are due to launch their new kit on Tuesday – and as of yesterday were still encouraging fans to pre-order on their website. The administrator, KPMG, will continue to run the business in administration with a skeleton staff and the company's New Zealand operation is unaffected.

The affected clubs now must decide whether to sign with a new supplier or hang on in the hope of a buyer being found who will negotiate new, almost certainly reduced, deals. Among the concerns that they will have to weigh up is the effect on fans who, as in the case of Leinster, have just rushed out to buy new replica kits.

www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2009/jul/15/digger-canterbury-kits-owen-gibson