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With Super Rugby back in action in South Africa on the weekend just gone, and Australia this weekend coming, moves in those countries are pulling the competition and SANZAAR as a body in two very different directions.
This coming Friday has emerged as the day where something – anything – becomes known about what the 2018 season will look like.
Even then though, this isn’t a development direct from SANZAAR; more on that later, and I will flag now that it’s a deadline that may or may not exist at all.
In Australia, the Super Rugby news of note is all around recruitment – just not in the way you might have expected in April, when the first noises of culling a team were made.
On Monday, the Melbourne Rebels announced that they had re-signed Nic Stirzaker and James Hanson to one-year deals for 2018, and promising young hooker Fereti Sa’aga and lock Steve Cummins to two-year contracts.
Stirzaker admitted he gave consideration to heading overseas, but in the end made the decision to stay for one more year.
“It was definitely tempting, shown by the amount of Australian players over there, probably speaks for itself, but at this stage for me I’m really happy to stay here,” he said.
“I’ve decided to stay and I’m really happy about that and confident that we’ll be around.
“If we’re not, I’ll tackle that then.”
AAP Image/Julian Smith
The four Rebels re-signings come on the back of the recruitment of Exeter Chiefs and former England lock Geoff Parling, along with Australian Under-20s scrumhalf Harrison Goddard, and Australian sevens young gun Henry Hutchinson.
A new head coach will be required to replace Tony McGahan, and it is expected Toby Smith will head back to New Zealand, Jack Debreczeni will head to Japan, while Mitch Inman has signed with French club Oyonnax.
The Rebels are also said to be close to re-signing rampaging Japanese international No.8 Amanaki Mafi.
The re-signings followed a string of announcements from the Western Force, where Jonno Lance’s new 2018 contract this week came hot on the heels of a string of daily re-signings over the last ten or so days: new Wallabies flanker Richard Hardwick (one year), lock Richie Arnold, scrumhalf Michael Ruru, promising prop Shambeckler Vui, hooker Anaru Rangi, prop Ben Daley, and homegrown winger Chance Peni (all two years).
So that’s 15 players committing their futures to teams that may or may not exist in 2018.
There are two ways of looking at this: either the players and their managers have cottoned onto the fact that they can guarantee a 2018 income one way or another, thanks the ARU assurances that all contracts with a club no longer operating will be paid out, or the clubs themselves are growing more and more confident that their position is safe for the immediate future.
And why would that be?
Well, I wonder if developments in South Africa might provide a clue.
Talk of the Cheetahs and Southern Kings being shipped off to the Pro12 competition have been around for a few weeks, but an article from The Times’ Scottish rugby correspondent Mark Palmer gave the clearest indication that a deal for the Irish-Welsh-Scottish-Italian league to take on the South African cast-offs is all but done.
Palmer reported that South African broadcasters Supersport were ready to table a deal that would provide a huge boost to the Pro12 coffers, and that the SARU was scrambling to find a solution for when “a third of their professional base will have nowhere to play when the revised Super Rugby format is ratified on Friday.”
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How would the Pro12 accommodate the new sides, possibly as soon as the 2017-18 season?
“As and when a series of shareholder and board meetings over the next ten days gives the green light, the expanded tournament is expected to be split into two seven-team conferences with immediate effect,” Palmer wrote on Sunday.
“The top three in each conference will progress to playoffs, with concerns over the reduction in guaranteed home games – currently 11 – being mitigated by the inclusion of one additional derby fixture. Glasgow and Edinburgh, for example, would play each other three times in the regular season.”
The Pro12 concerns sound scarily familiar, don’t they?
And doesn’t South Africa holding up their end of the Super Rugby revolution bargain put more pressure on the ARU? Maybe.
But consider this.
If indeed there is a 2018 Super Rugby-ratifying meeting this Friday, and the ARU walk in with their tail between their legs, and mutter “we’ve, um, still got five teams” while staring at the floor, there is still a very simple – and maybe ideal – solution staring everyone in the face.
Sixteen teams in 2018. No conferences. Everyone plays everyone once. Fifteen games and two byes. Three weeks of finals. Competition runs same length as this season.
It might just be the answer. And we’ll have the Celts and the Italians to thank for it.