- Video
-
Club Roar
Captured a great grassroots sporting moment? We want to see it!Content Collections
The Roar Community
- Join
- Login
How will Super Rugby expand in 2015 at the expected beginning of the next television rights deal? Argentina is touted as a future power, but its premier club rugby, if I’m not mistaken, is currently fully amateur.
So SANZAR will be unable to give our South American brethren their own full conference until they are able to create depth through having at least two teams – think Australia before Super 12.
Why didn’t they include two teams then and start the Super 14 and ‘Quad-Nations’ in 1996?
Now I have a way in which SANZAR gets to grow its own backyard further and sow seeds that could reap huge rewards for the game.
2015 Super Rugby should include a fourth conference based in Argentina (two teams) and one team in each of South Africa (Southern Kings), New Zealand (Central Falcons) and Australia (East Coast Cavaliers, based in Central Coast/Newcastle, New South Wales, and Gold Coast, Queensland).
The three overseas teams should be replaced in the following season’s conference by the lowest placed team in their ‘home’ conference.
Each Super team to play the other four teams in their conference twice, as well as a guaranteed two teams (home and away) from each of the other three’s, as well another one from two of the other conferences.
This is effectively this year’s comp just with more teams, as it will include the same formats round-robin of eight home games and eight away games, followed by a three-week finals series.
But the 2015 format will include another conference, so the finals will have to expand to automatically include the top ranked team and add another wildcard to bump it up to eight out of 20:
– Competition to start on the first weekend of March and finish in the last/fourth weekend of July.
– Followed by two weeks break then the ‘home’ Tests on the third, fourth and fifth weekends of August.
– One weeks break then three rounds of Quad-Nations/Pacific Nations Cup on the second, third and fourth weekends of September, followed by another weeks break and the other three rounds on the second, third and fourth weekends of October.
– One more weeks break followed by the third Bledisloe/Cavaliers Cup Test (the Cavaliers Cup is a fictional trophy in reference of a possible non-fictional future one contested between South Africa and Argentina), followed by three away Tests on the second, third and fourth weekends of November.
– Since 2015 is a World Cup year, all international expansion plans will be put off until the next year, and a Southern Cup or championship will be held in its place.
– An eight-team tournament contested between New Zealand, South Africa, Australia, Argentina, Japan, Fiji, Tonga and Samoa in World Cup years.
– Teams to be placed within two pools with two teams from the quad nations (NZ and Australia/SA and Argentina) and two teams from Pacific Nations (Samoa and Japan/Fiji and Tonga).
– Play each team in your pool once (with quad nations to get home advantage over pacific nations/or pools to be fully based in quad nations), followed by a finals series of semis and grand final matches to take to match count to five, which is the same as this years Tri-Nations plus one match against a pacific side, e.g. Australia versus Samoa or NZ versus Fiji.
– After the Super Rugby comp finishes, each competing country will revert to international and provincial rugby with both Australia and Argentina to incorporate a semi-pro provincial/state comp and NZ and SA to expand theirs to 13 weeks (10 week round robin and a three weeks finals series, opening on the first weekend of September and concluding on the fourth weekend of November).
– Australian Rugby Championship to be reborn and contested between Northern Queensland, Sunshine Coast, Brisbane, Gold Coast, Hunter Valley, Central Coast/NSW Country and North Sydney in the Northern/Upper Australian Division, and West Sydney, Sydney City, Illawarriors, Canberra Vikings, Victoria Axemen, Adelaide Angels and Perth Spirit in the Southern/Lower Australian Division.
– Salary to be capped at between one million and eight hundred thousand New Zealand dollars, due to it being lower and therefore more cost efficient, or 36 per cent of each unions/franchises revenues per year.
– Argentina Rugby Championship to based on the same format but salary to be capped a bit lower and partly funded by IRB and SANZAR.
This is part one of my plan as I only wanted to start off with baby steps, per say. I also would like to know your guys’ thoughts…
Join The Roar rugby editor Christy Doran, former Wallaby Matt Toomua and a cast of regular and special guests as they look at the biggest issues in the game on The Roar Rugby Podcast. If you’re looking for great odds on the next game check out Aussie bookmaker PlayUp. Chances are you’re about to lose. Set a deposit limit.