Super Rugby AU is back and looking more different than ever, with a new broadcaster ready to bring you all the action from the 2021 competition. With so much change, you’ll need to be all over the new ways you’ll have to watch every match. So without further ado, here is The Roar’s guide to live streaming every moment of the season, or watching it on your TV.
The following instructions will also apply to Super Rugby Aotearoa in New Zealand, as well as the upcoming Super Rugby Trans-Tasman competition.
The Super Rugby AU season kicks off today, Friday, February 19, with the Reds hosting the Waratahs at Suncorp Stadium from 7:45pm (AEDT), before the Western Force battle the Brumbies at Perth’s HBF Park at 10pm (AEDT).
The season will run until Saturday, May 8, when the top two sides in the five-team competition will play off in the final.
Super Rugby Aotearoa will follow an almost identical schedule, but will start a week later on Friday, February 26. Super Rugby AU will also feature an additional ‘qualifying final’ on Saturday, May 1, featuring the second and third-placed sides.
After that, the Super Rugby Trans-Tasman competition will immediately begin, with games beginning on Friday, May 14. It will feature the five Super Rugby AU teams against their Aotearoa counterparts across both Australia and New Zealand, with the final to be played between the two top teams on Saturday, June 19.
With Fox Sports ending their broadcast agreement with Super Rugby at the end of the 2020 season, rugby in Australia has a new home on Stan Sports.
Stan is the online streaming service owned by Nine Entertainment, and will show every single match of all three Super Rugby competitions live and on-demand – and ad-free. They will also be showing all Super W, Shute Shield, Currie Cup, New Zealand provincial matches and almost all Wallabies and Wallaroos matches throughout the year.
To access it, you’ll need to get a Stan Sports subscription which costs $10 a month on top of an existing standard Stan subscription. Note that you cannot only buy the Sport package on its own, so the effective cost will be at least $20 per month. New customers can activate a 30-day free trial, which will have you covered for the early rounds of the season.
Without a Stan Sports subscription, you will still be able to watch some – but not all – of this season’s Super Rugby matches.
The Reds-Waratahs season opener on Friday night will be broadcast live on 9GEM (channel 92, or 95 for HD) across the country. After that, every Saturday night Super Rugby AU match will also be live on the Nine Network, including the final.
It is expected but not yet confirmed that this will also be the arrangement for the Super Rugby Trans-Tasman season, but for Australian games only. All Super Rugby Aotearoa matches, as well as Trans-Tasman games played in New Zealand, will be exclusively on Stan Sport.
If you’re still stuck for options, you can always count on us here at The Roar for live blogs and minute-by-minute updates of every match.
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