The world game? Rugby now plays a global season

I 100% agree with you. You do have to admit that the NH clubs are a real strength in that they develop talent and have valuable dynamic leagues. National Unions can work within current windows. Leagues also. Issues still to be solved are the long season and this only exists for Test players. Other players are generally happy. Test players need to be managed but how this is done need not damage the league. Taking All Blacks out of at least 2 rounds of Super Rugby can damage this competition. In a normal year you would hope Stars could be managed better by their clubs under a stronger collective not told when they must take a rest.

But that requires the NH clubs to put Test rugby first. They may all be holding hands and singing Kumbayah at the moment (don't know, don't care) but I'd put no money on that always being the case. Ask George North and Northhampton how things go when players and clubs make agreements about player priorities. Or the French clubs about whether club championships or the first Test on tour takes priority. At the moment something gets priority and it isn't Tests. The All Blacks might get rested - the NH has a very different structure and set of priorities.

I fully agree with Six Nations chief executive John Feehan who says they will not shift the Window. And there is no compelling reason to. Issues such as player welfare and a 'more structured' season are not compelling according to him. I also see his point. If players are playing too many games, it is not because of Test matches, it is because of club commitments. Top players can easilt be managed throughout a season and rested and start later as the All Blacks are. The current windows for tests are great and provide variety and satisfy consumers in over 170 countries. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/rugbyunion/international/sixnations/11329921/Six-Nations-to-be-shifted-to-later-in-the-season-No-chance-says-organiser.html

a lot of people can't count....14 tests a year plus training camps and traveling equals 20 weeks. 20 games of Super rugby (assuming you are make the final) is a further 24 weeks (ore season)....that's a 44 week season.....

May I remind you of the other centrally contracted team in the Home Nations and their score against the Wallabies this past November. These are not just accidents and we cannot keep blaming things on the wind, steroids, refereeing or some other excuse. Ireland and Wales are the two major success stories in the last 5 years of European rugby and Wales has learned a lot from what Ireland has done and both have learned a lot from New Zealand. Central contracts are one aspect, the symbiotic relationship it creates between the national union and major clubs is another. This effect has been in place in Wales for a few years since the first calls or steps toward Central contacts were announced. Overseas players head home, younger players stay put. He signalled a desire to choose from within Wales.

Yes, but it was signalled more than a year or two out that it was coming. It coincides with Gatland preferring Wales based players. As with economics ir was not just the final implementation but the signal of the action.

You are reaching. The WRU decision to dual contract players has only just begun. As Lion Down Under pointed out above, only 6 players are in the fold to date. There was even less prior to the November series. Winning one match against SA is not really proof of whether this is working. And hardly an argument to say that Wales is now a real force in world rugby - whatever that means. Were they not a force in world rugby prior to central contracting being introduced which is only 6 months ago?

I would have said March through Nov/Dec, but that would be an obvious point of negotiation. As to your other points: 1. I would expect they would move if necessary, but wouldn't be waiting on NH domestic rugby to be over. 3. The NH plays their domestic comps interspersed and in parallel with Test rugby...there would be no reason why they couldn't still do so if that was their preference. No long break, the only real requirement likely to be that the ERCC matches would be done before the Tests started/about the same time SR was done. They'd probably want to do that anyway if they wanted a clash of champions before the Tests. 2. In which case I'd initially imagine it as ERCC/SR => NH tour SH => 6N/RC => SH tour NH, with NH domestic rugby running throughout and SR then CC/ITMC/NRC in the SH. Whether it would stay that way as wider opportunities became apparent, who knows. But as previously, the advantage would be the players starting with club rugby and building to Tests, all inter-hemisphere matches with teams at equivalent point in their seasons, and the RC/6N being played by teams both having had time together and in the prime of their season. Who knows, the whole thing could even culminate in a NH v SH match to showcase the sport...

Of course it was a test match, and I made no excuses, The comments I made was fact.

A shift to a NH Summer season would mean kick off in February and finals in October for a 9 month Season. Let me outline a few issues: 1. If the current Test match windows are left as they are where Super Rugby finishes in July/August, then where is the Alignment? Since NH teams would wrap up 2months later. They are closer aligned now. 2. If the 9 month NH is compressed into 6 consecutive months followed by a long test match window, the issue with this is that playing 12-14 test matches in a row is both unusual and tedious for fans. 3 short test windows keeps fan interest up. 3. The 6month +3month mehod also doesn't suit the style of European sports including rugby and football who like longer seasons mixed with different competitions and games and can engage their fans. A long break from August to January would not suit Toulon or Saracens.

BB it was a test match. End of story. The same Springboks beat England the week before. Excuses will not change the fact that Wales is now a real force in World rugby and Gatland and Moffat's influence on getting central contract model in place is one if the main reasons.

Because those major sports and rugby in Europe are winter sports. We are talking about what it would look like if Rugby in the NH became a summer sport. When do the major summer sports in North America and Europe start?

Wales beating SA in the last test was an embarressment to rugby. Not just for the fact that SA lost, but the manner in which both teams played. The end result was a lottery of which team gets the most kicks at goal. I would not read anything in that win, all Wales can take out of that is they were poor but SA was poorer. All SA can take out of that game is never play an additional test at the end of the season, and of course they were pretty damn pathetic in that test.

Wales beating the Springboks was absolutely nothing to do with Central Contracting. Even now - 2 months after the November Tests - there are not even 6 players on Central Contracts in Wales (Tyler Morgan is considered a "development contract" as he's never been capped, Sam Warburton, Dan Lydiate, Hallam Amos, Rhodri Jones & Jake Ball are the 5 Centrally Contracted players). All except Warburton signed after the SA Test. These names are not the shining lights of Welsh rugby.

I used to think the year started in January or March too. Until I moved here to Korea. They are considering moving the school year to start in September to match North America. Where by the way many major sports start in September. Just like Rugby in Europe.

I don't think we are. A global season in this context might be (say) everyone starting club rugby in March, then Tests from September through December. Club rugby doesn't need to be over before the Tests start (any more than it is now), so long as the ERCC and SR are done. At least that way there would be a progression in standard, with the season culminating in the Test match-ups rather than ad-hoc match-ups between teams at the end of their season against sides having their first hit-out as a group.

True, true. Its merely wishful thinking on my part: - more mid-year tests (eg five) - a few more teams visiting - More opportunity to challenging the rankings. Not sure though how that may ever be possible.

Wales beat the Springboks in the last Northern tours and this was widely credited to Gatland's insistence on Central contracting. His players were together, fresh and played as a unit. Results speak. http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-11-30/wales-sink-springboks-end-southern-hemisphere-hoodoo/5928622 Super Rugby finishes 6-8 weeks after Nothern hemisphere competitions finish. But most of the top players in the top clubs of Europe will be involved in the June Test Window so they will finish playing in 30 June. So the difference is far far smaller than you are imagining. It is a matter of a couple of weeks. The claim that there is such a massive difference between the North and South is gone when you realise the finals for each competition occur within a matter of weeks of eachother and a separated by a test window - which means the top players are playing though that anyway. Effectively if the final for the English Premiership were moved forward one week it would occur on the 6-7 July. If commercial reality in the Norther preferred (only if they preferred) the ERC final could easily be moved until after the June Window and a World Club challenge game after the Super Rugby Final. Both teams would be fresh and peaking from their seasons which overlap by virtually 99%. The only difference is that S15 is shorter because it starts later. None of this is trying to force a global season, but it will come from broadcasters seeing the financial potential from making a small adjustment which allows the winners to play off. This does not require much at all in terms of a global season. It may not require any adjustments to competitions in the North if they feel their players can be rested at other times in the season. A global season is really only necessary to enable a playoff of the SH and NH club winners and allow test matches to be played fresh but the latter is already occurring by other means - central contracting and player rotation.

"This has nothing to do with a global season but was recently solved by Wales through central contracting where test players loads are managed and they are given rest from club games during the season. England hates this system but the Wales test team has reaped the benefits." How has the very recent dual contracting brought in by the WRU (still only applying to a small number of players) helped the Wales team to reap benefits? "The Super and NH seasons overlap and finish within a month of each other. This is as standardized as things will get." They don't really overlap. NH club season starts in early August in France and 3 weeks later in Ireland, UK and Italy. It finishes with the Top 14 final played in early June. There are test windows within that in November and Feb/Mar. Player management programmes have been getting stronger in recent seasons but not massively. The best exponent of it has been Ireland with a very strict PMP that limits appearances of test players throughout the season. So much so, that English and French clubs complained that it was helping Irish teams to win the H Cup in recent years. The answer has been to increase squad sizes to effectively run two teams for parallel comps and to be able to play during test windows. Building super squads takes money and the new European TV deals for English and French clubs will see the gap grow between the bigger clubs and the rest. In France, each T14 team plays 26 x T14 matches in regular season and 6 of the top teams also play a minimum of 5 H Cup matches, excluding knockout stages. In Ireland UK, each club team plays a minimum of 22 games plus 5 in the H Cup. That's 31 games in France and 27 games in Ireland, UK and Italy. Playoffs and knockouts would add a further 3-6 matches on top of that for qualifying teams. Last year, the S15 season started in mid-February for 24 weeks and ended on 2 August. 9 of the six teams were finished by 12 July. About 70% of the players in the comp had a break between 1 June and 26 June before the final two rounds. Each team plays 16 matches in the regular season before playoffs. "The issue of players being worn out and tired after a long season doesn’t exist in the Southern Hemisphere so is not a Global Season issue." And yet you will hear commentary from SH commentators during November tests about teams from Australia and SA being tired after a long season. If it isn't an issue, then would it make sense to just shift the June tours to either before or after the 6N? The NH club season could then finish in June instead of May.

You are suggesting that SH nations should play preseason matches against these teams. It would then be the Southern Hemisphere that would be the farce. The June and November windows are midseason for a reason. They are a compromise. Player tiredness and injuries has nothing to do with when the tests are played. It is how the players are managed by their clubs. SH players in November are fresh and win because they are managed better. It's not a global season issue. You would need to talk to Toulon and Saracens owners.