Ex Supersport
Vodacom Super Rugby will undergo a major revamp in 2016 with an 18-team format and four-conference system set to be unveiled over the next few days.
The Sanzar partners were due to make an announcement this coming Monday, with the tender process for an as yet to be confirmed franchise to be outlined then, but Australian Rugby Union boss Bill Pulver spilled the beans to Australian media on Tuesday.
South Africa will have two of the four conferences under the new format, with the six local franchises being joined by an Argentine side plus the as yet unconfirmed franchise that could be based anywhere in the world. It would be preferred if the additional franchise was based somewhere roughly on a similar time zone to South Africa, but the main criteria will be money, playing strength/potential and logistics, in that order.
The South African conferences will be made up of four teams each, with the sides playing home and away against each other initially before moving into a five-team cross conference phase of the tournament against teams in the Australasian conferences. The Australasian conferences will be divided in a New Zealand and Australian section made up of five teams each.
After that the teams will play across conference against the other teams in their conference system. In other words, if the Bulls start off in the same conference as the Cheetahs, Kings and the team from Argentina, they will play those teams on a home and away basis at the start of the season and will then play either the five teams in the Australian conference or the New Zealand conference, with two matches away and three at home or vice-versa.
They will then conclude by playing the teams in the other South African conference, eg Stormers, Sharks, Lions and the tto-be-announced team in one off games, with two of those matches being played at home and two away. Who the teams play away and who they play at home will alternate on an annual basis, as will the number of away games when the teams play against Australasian franchises.
There are integrity problems related to the new tournament in that not all teams will play each other and some sides will end up with more difficult schedules than others. For instance, a side will play only against teams in one Australasian conference in a specific year, meaning that the Bulls will face either all the New Zealand teams or all the Australian teams, but there won’t be a mix.
The following year, the team will face the franchises that they didn’t play in the 2016 season. The drawback of this is that in a year where the Australian conference is weaker than the New Zealand one it will mean the sides playing the Australian ones will be advantaged. The New Zealand and Australian teams will also not play home and away against all the other teams in their respective conferences.
However that disadvantage is outweighed by the positives of having fewer games – 15 as against the previous 16 (ONE GAME!)– in the league phase of the competition, and also the significantly diminished travel schedule for the South African teams. Playing two games in Australasia, which means they could be away for as little as one and a half weeks, is a significant step forward in comparison to the current system which sees local sides spending up to five weeks on the road.
South African players are said to be eager to embrace matches in Argentina, which would happen just once a season. It is a relatively short flight from Johannesburg to Buenos Aires, and teams can leave South Africa on a Tuesday and be back home by the following Sunday or Monday.
There will be more games – 44 – in South Africa under the new format, but that is explained by the addition of the sixth franchise. New Zealand and Australia will be hosting slightly fewer games than before.
In the new format eight teams will advance to the finals stage, with four sides playing each other in the quarterfinals, followed by a semifinal and a final.
The new format has been extensively worked through with the player associations in the Sanzar countries and will be welcomed because of the significantly smaller travel component for all players .
NEW SUPER RUGBY FORMAT EXPLAINED
SOUTH AFRICAN CONFERENCES
CONFERENCE 1 (teams as examples, conferences not finalised)
Sharks
Lions
Cheetahs
Argentina team
CONFERENCE 2
Bulls
Stormers
Southern Kings
Team to be confirmed (possibly Asian)
The teams in these conferences will start the season playing within their conference, in other words against the other three teams on a home and away basis. They will then proceed to the next phase of the season, which will see them play either the five teams in the New Zealand conference or the Australian conference.
AUSTRALASIAN CONFERENCES
NEW ZEALAND CONFERENCE
Highlanders
Blues
Crusaders
Chiefs
Hurricanes
AUSTRALIAN CONFERENCE
Rebels
Reds
Waratahs
Western Force
Brumbies
After this phase the teams in SA conference 1 will play against the teams in SA conference 2, meaning another four games, with two of them being played at home and two away.
Eight teams go into Finals phase.
The top four teams will proceed straight to the semifinals, with the other four sides (the means of arriving at those still to be determined) playing in the quarterfinals.
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