Rugby finances fine ahead of Israel Folau’s $10m legal claim, Raelene Castle says

Rugby boss Raelene Castle plays down suggestions the sacked Wallaby could win $10m.

Ralene Castle, left, and Israel Folau.

Rugby Australia chief executive Raelene Castle has played down suggestions sacked Wallaby Israel Folau could win up to $10 million from a successful unfair dismissal claim and declared that the sport’s finances are “fine’ as it confronts the law suit.

Ms Castle, speaking ahead of the Wallabies match against the All Blacks at Eden Park in New Zealand tomorrow which could see the Bledisloe Cup return to Australia for the first time since 2002, said Rugby Australia was defending the values of the game in its dispute with Folau.

Folau launched legal action seeking an apology, $10m in damages and his contract to be reinstated by the NSW Waratahs and Rugby Australia, which claim the world-class player breached their code of conduct with a social media post in April.

In an Instagram post, Folau said “drunks, homosexuals, adulterers, liars, fornicators, thieves, atheists and idolaters’’ would go to hell unless they repented.

Speaking on Sky News this morning Ms Castle played down the implications of the legal dispute for the game.

The case could go to trial in February and this week Folau’s lawyers said he still wanted an apology for his alleged unfair dismissal.

“I think there are some fairly large figures being thrown around which certainly from Rugby Australia’s point of view we don’t think are achievable through this process,’’ Ms Castle said.

“What I can assure everyone is... the financial stability of the game is fine. This won’t stop us spending the money in the Rugby community. Probably the disappointing thing is we are spending money on legal fees that we could otherwise have been spent additionally in helping the game grow in this country. But that is the reality of where we are.’’

Ms Castle maintained the Folau dispute was an employment contract dispute.

His social media obligations had been clearly set out in his contract.

She said Rugby Australia had tried to resolve the situation outside the court system “but we have been unsuccessful in doing that to date’’.

Asked whether Rugby Australia should simply apologise to Folau, Ms Castle said the sport was about inclusion for everybody. “And we’ve got portions of our community who were very hurt and upset by Israel’s comments, hence why we are in this situation.’’

Asked whether some team members had said they did not want to play with Folau, Ms Castle said: “No. The thing as you know about team sport, it’s about everybody ensuring that they put the team first at critical times.’’

Ms Castle said that with the benefit of hindsight things could have been done better, but she had had three clear conversations with Folau about Rugby Australia’s expectations relating to his social media posts — after an earlier post taking aim at homosexuals last year.

She said from her position there was no doubt that Folau had signed a contract supporting Rugby Australia’s position.