{"id":167842,"date":"2025-09-25T09:51:07","date_gmt":"2025-09-25T09:51:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/167842\/"},"modified":"2025-09-25T09:51:07","modified_gmt":"2025-09-25T09:51:07","slug":"premiership-rugby-in-talks-to-stage-league-match-at-chicago-cubs-wrigley-field-premiership","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/167842\/","title":{"rendered":"Premiership Rugby in talks to stage league match at Chicago Cubs\u2019 Wrigley Field | Premiership"},"content":{"rendered":"

Premiership Rugby is in talks about staging a game at Wrigley Field in Chicago next season, the first attempt to move a game abroad since Saracens played Newcastle in Philadelphia in 2017<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The eye-catching plan to hold a game at Chicago Cubs\u2019 famous home would be a significant boost to rugby union in the United States, hosts of the 2031 Rugby World Cup.<\/p>\n

Premiership Rugby has rebranded the competition<\/a> as the Gallagher Prem for this season, which begins with Gloucester\u2019s trip to Sale on Thursday evening, and is actively courting investment from America.<\/p>\n

The title sponsors are commercial partners of Major League Baseball\u2019s Chicago Cubs and their Wrigley Field, where part of the ballpark is known as Gallagher Way.<\/p>\n

The Guardian has learned that Premiership<\/a> Rugby has had discussions about taking a game to Wrigley Field during the 2026-27 season. It would coincide with the 100th anniversary of Gallagher, a Chicago-based insurance company. Gallagher and the Cubs are understood to be receptive, while numerous Prem clubs would be interested despite the need to sacrifice a home fixture.<\/p>\n

Premiership Rugby engaged New York-based bank Raine Group and accountants Deloitte earlier this year with a brief to attract new investors, specifically from the United States. They ran the Hundred \u00a3520m auction for the England and Wales Cricket Board in January, so have a track record of delivering investment in English sport.<\/p>\n

The Premiership Rugby Trophy rests on the Philadelphia Art Museum in 2017 before Saracens played Newcastle in the US city. Photograph: Mitchell Leff\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Raine Group and Deloitte are understood to have been told to market both the Prem as a competition and seek stakes in individual English clubs. The Austrian energy drinks company Red Bull bought Newcastle Falcons last summer, <\/a>while the Jordan Group has agreed<\/a> to buy London Irish, who are hoping to rejoin the new second-tier Champ next season.<\/p>\n

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A Gallagher spokesperson told the Guardian: \u201cWe would love to have a Prem game in Chicago, where our global headquarters are, particularly as we shortly are about to mark our centenary year of trading. There are no firm plans in place as yet.\u201d<\/p>\n

Premiership Rugby has targeted America before with mixed results. Saracens and London Irish played in New York in 2016<\/a> and the following year Newcastle and Saracens met in Philadelphia, but that game attracted just 6,000 fans.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Premiership Rugby is in talks about staging a game at Wrigley Field in Chicago next season, the first…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":167843,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85],"class_list":["post-167842","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-rugby","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167842","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=167842"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167842\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/167843"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=167842"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=167842"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=167842"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}