Super 16 Comp from 2013

It's just been annouced the Southern Kings will compete Super Rugby in 2013. Is this a genuine franchise or a Barbarians style one like the Australian one?

Also, they are looking to field a 6th SA side in the Tournament. Given that currently most years; 2 SA, 2 (at least) Australian and one NZ team struggle every year.

Is this a desirable outcome? Money over Quality, less Player rest times recovering from injuries - UNLESS they are considering a two tier arrangement - which seems unlikely.

In my opinion, Super Rugby has been less than that for some years. The idea of it was for it to be a Tier between Provincial and Test Rugby.

Diluting it with a multi-racial set up on the lines of the Top14 is undesirable to say the least. Thoughts... especially from our SA fans?

Yep, it is like I said before, the SUPER rugby comp is no longer Super. If this is actually going to happen it is purely there to accommodate the political agenda of SARU to appease the politicians demanding more transformation.

The fact is the Kings are pathetic and will receive thumpings of epic proportion.

You wont have too many years to wait for the World Club Competition involving sides from Northern and Southern Hemispheres

Hmmm, don't know. That would be expensive and logistically difficult.

Shame they are diluting the quality.

I thought the plan was for the Southern Kings to participate and the bottom finisher amongst the other SA teams would be relegated.

This wouls throw the Super Rugby calendar into a tizzy. Not sure this makes sense.

How will the conference system work now?

The problem with these people is that they think more is better. OK, the 4N is better than the 3N. The Super 12 sounded better than the Super 10 as there were an even amount of teams per country. Now it´s getting ridiculous. You can't have this tournament dominate the SH tournament but that's exactly what it's doing. It's getting so long now they have to take a few weeks out in June to fit in the internationals. But it starts in February! How can anyone think a tournament that drags on for so long is good for the game is beyond me.

Kia,
But thats somewhat similar to how the current season (dis)functions now in the Northern Hemisphere. Welcome to my nightmare.........

I think if anyone was sitting down today to craft a Rugby season, the existing mess would never enter anyone's conciousness. Not ever a kernal of a germ of thought. Even if the person drank a case of cheap booze. Too bizarre and too illogical. And now things have become so entrenched, the effort to undo the damage would drive anyone to Bedlam (if it was still open). Shame.

Agree. Way too many. The relegation system wouldnt work either. It would mean contracts would be limited to one year as what would happen to those players during the year off?
What would the relegated team do in the year off and what would make them more suitable to rejoin than the one its replacing? Would they pick up the relegated players?
Doesnt work. There needs to be established franchises able to stand on their own. There are already 3 or 4 too many.

Stating the obvious lose one franchise from each Country ,say Western force/Barbarian team.Blues/Chiefs,Lions/Cheetahs combining go back to a
Super 12 with 4 strong teams each.
More time for Rand R,stronger tournament[intheory] less injuries a stronger Test side.
Every one wins,obviously it isn`t that simple but things along those lines would be.

Well everyone except those who stood to collect the millions in ticket sales

Why is the Kings being added to the pot regarded differently from the inclusion of the Rebels, for example?
This is not a WUM, I'm trying to understanding the political and practical distinctions

It's not George
The Rebels was a dumb idea because rugby doesn't really exist there. No / nearly no local (Melbourne) players
The Kings is a bad idea because the competition is too big and long and SA really only has enough players for 3 or 4 competitive teams not 6

nganboy wrote:The Rebels was a dumb idea because rugby doesn't really exist there. No / nearly no local (Melbourne) players
The Kings is a bad idea because the competition is too big and long and SA really only has enough players for 3 or 4 competitive teams not 6

I thought the concept of Rugby in Melbourne is precisely because there is no Rugby there. Spreading into a new and untapped market. Hoping it would be a springboard to growing Rugby there. A simple investment and logical strategy. Hope it pays off, but I think the payoff won't be for a few years. Spreading the gospel of the Game Played in Heaven to the heathens.

The Southern Kings, if I am not mistaken, is another part of the bizarre political mosaic which is unique to South Africa. I agree, from my vantage point a long way away, six teams in The Republic is too much and will only dilute talent further.

It'd be ok if this were a NH type set up where the travel is short and quick and fans of a much larger base can go both home and away on a regular basis.

Even though the conference system reduces travel the reality is fans only attend home matches. Perth for example have a minimum 5 hour flight for their nearest away game.

Reality for the rebels is they are competing for the sporting mecca of oz sport with oz rules, an increasing rugby league population and football.

The only way to squeeze anymore rugby dollars out of fans is to add another franchise.

If they end up having franchises in Argentina it will be ridiculous.

If they end up having franchises in Argentina it will be ridiculous

An Argentinian franchise would actually make sense as now the national team are in the 4N the value of Argentinian players in the NH is dropping significantly. Those internationals will be missing for the first however, many weeks of the season then would reappear for a couple of games before going off for the AIs. Any team with an Argentinian international would be expecting them to go missing for the majority of the first half of the season. The option for those internationals to go to the SH would be logistically more relevent and would help the players adapt to the type of game they are likely to face with their national team.

Of course it would make sense for the reasons you mentioned.
But having a conference system in 4 different countries on the other sides of the world from each other is impractical.

If they are going to offer franchises to Argentina, then hopefully they will have the sense to go to 12 teams, three from each nation.

Perhaps in the beginning Argentina might only be abe to fill two teams, so NZ can have 1 extra team.

The alternative is to go back to a format where there are no conferences and each country has 5 team all playing each other on a round robin basis, but each squad can have 3 players from argentina.

This way you could have 45 or so Argentine players in the super rugby comp.

A conference setup wouldnt work for argentina if they didnt play the other franchises often as theyd be hammered playoff time. So that means a lot of crazy timezone mixing on a weekly basis across the 3 continents. A scheduling nightmare.
As part of argie agreeing to join the 4N they should have negotiated at least one franchise where argie practically all play as one to build confidence or negotiate contracts with the current franchises.
To just join the 4N SH season without a corresponding feeder level during the sxv window just seems crazy.

And to add to that the ARU have been talking about getting a professional domestic league up and running since 2007 yet nothing has happened.

Unfortunately it has really only be the supporters talking about a national third tier for all this time gowales. I dont think I have heard anything good, bad or nuetral out of the ARU for 2 or 3 years since they cancelled the ARC.

Personally I dont think a national comp is going to happen while Super Rugby exists, but I would like them to make use of the derby games to play matches between the Sydney - Brisbane - Canberra - Melbourne - Perth rep teams (no new brands / slogans / mascots / logos / gimics required thanks JON - just Sydney Rugby would be fine). They could do it relatively cheaply and gain some great benefits out of it, plus it would be a safe first step. Unfortunately the topic remains all talk.

boomeranga wrote:Unfortunately it has really only be the supporters talking about a national third tier for all this time gowales. I dont think I have heard anything good, bad or nuetral out of the ARU for 2 or 3 years since they cancelled the ARC.

Personally I dont think a national comp is going to happen while Super Rugby exists, but I would like them to make use of the derby games to play matches between the Sydney - Brisbane - Canberra - Melbourne - Perth rep teams (no new brands / slogans / mascots / logos / gimics required thanks JON - just Sydney Rugby would be fine). They could do it relatively cheaply and gain some great benefits out of it, plus it would be a safe first step. Unfortunately the topic remains all talk.

My bad i meant ArgentinaRU. However i do agree that the Australians should try and get something up and running but they have a lot more sports to compete with then Argentina does.

The ArgentinaRU, wanted to keep rugby amature in Argentina, they will pay now for international players and 'A' teams but want to keep teh clubs amature, somehow?

Personally I see Argentina creating 4 provinicial sides in a few years, and keeping the best players in Argentina.

There is already a strong link between SA and Argentina, with an Argentina side entering the Vodaphone cup(?) one below Currie cup.

The way I see it is Argentina (4 teams) and SA (6 teams) will form a 10 team league, and NZ (5 teams) and AUS (5 teams) the same. Top four from each will play for a Super Cup, second 4 in each will play for a Super Plate/Shield, and bottom 2 in each get to look back on a bad year.

It would cut down on a lot of travel and be fair enough, not like the round robin conference thing.

How can SA who has two teams already that every year hold up the others demand a 6th.A reduction to 4 each would make more sense ,4 Argentina sides ?.Maybe in 5years time,IF this comes about the teams concerned will
hardly use test Players at all.
Good for developing young players,but bad for the test sides.

The proposal was regected by the SANZAR

http://www.planetrugby.com/story/0,25883,16024_7474547,00.html

Well the conference system isn't really cracked up to be the answer in the first place.

IF SANZAR have their wits about them they will reduce the teams to 4 per country and change the format of their domestic competitions to serve as a pre qualifier for the four teams of each nation that will qualify for the 4 spots per country.

If SARU for example play their 6 team Currie cup at the end of the year between Aug and October of every year and then the four top teams qualify for the super 12 then they can keep most people happy.

South Africa should tell SANZAR to stick it where the sun don't shine. You guys have more than enough depth to fill 6 teams. The cards are in SA's hands in my opinion.

Surely you are joking Gowales.
Look at the overall Super Rugby records and see how many teams SA can really support.
Recently SA have done well in the comp but for a while it was looking very poor.
Even NZ, which has won it the most with the Crusaders and the Blues, has always had the highlanders or the chiefs as everybody's whipping boy.
The Lions have always struggled to win anything and even the Bulls used to be a joke(a while a go now)

Competitive wise SA can sustain 3 top teams Sharks, Bulls and Stormers. If the Lions get their act together they can be as dominant.

Think back to the early nineties before Louis Luyt was ousted. The Lions was not only the top team in SA, but won the Super 6 and was one of the richest franchises in the SH, if not the wealthiest.

Politics have ruined them.

We will never be able to build another 2 top franchises in the current dispensation.

The Freestate simply do not have enough money to hold on to their top players, they have been the feeder system for in particular the sharks and are spread across the other franchises.

The Eastern Cape has even less money, in their hayday the Eastern Province was much stronger before Professional rugby came to be.

New Zealand in my opinion can also really only build 4 top quality teams, and australia perhaps 3.

If you want to keep Super rugby, SUPER, you need to reduce the teams.

But for the sake of television money and gate money, a second tier is the answer. As this can also encompass Argentina building franchises.

I just tend to think more now is worse now matter how you dress it due to the travel factor- the unique aspect of this competition- unless its a local one.

As far as NZ is concerned every franchise has made the super final at least once but some have seen some pretty lean years.

formerly known as Sam wrote:An Argentinian franchise would actually make sense as now the national team are in the 4N the value of Argentinian players in the NH is dropping significantly. Those internationals will be missing for the first however, many weeks of the season then would reappear for a couple of games before going off for the AIs. Any team with an Argentinian international would be expecting them to go missing for the majority of the first half of the season. The option for those internationals to go to the SH would be logistically more relevent and would help the players adapt to the type of game they are likely to face with their national team.

I agree, it has been proven Italy have not developed at all since joining the 6 Nations because 5 games a year where their players have to step up a level is too much of a gap for them.

Now they have Aironi and Treviso in the Robocop league their week to week standard of rugby is better so they will get better.

The Tri Nations is far more ruthless than the 6 Nations, so Argentina may get minced. It would make a lot of sense for Buenos Aires and possibly Tucuman to be added to give their players a chance to improve, in the Super 15.