By Boz the Younger, 4 Apr 2016
Does the new Super Rugby structure benefit South Africa too much? YES YES YES
There have been a number of articles about the new Super Rugby format being a shemozzle, but I have withheld judgement until now.
I have been sceptical about the inclusion of the sixth South African team, the Kings, but I have liked the idea of including a Argentinean and Japanese teams. The teams from new countries add a different flavour to the competition and helping rugby grow its non-traditional strongholds appeals to me.
After several weeks, I don’t like the new format. This is due to the way the draw is set up, which unfairly favours South African teams. As Africa has two conferences, two African teams are guaranteed spots as conference leaders.
This advantages those teams by putting them higher on the pecking order to host finals series games than potentially better teams in the Australian and New Zealand conferences. This is an advantage both in improving the odds of a win and in revenues for the African conference clubs.
Compounding this unfairness is that the inclusion of three new teams, the Kings, Sunwolves and Jaguares, are all in the African conferences. This means that the best South African teams like the Stormers and the Sharks have more bankable wins and are better able to manage player workloads.
Even the weaker South African franchises are benefitting from this, does anybody really think the Lions would currently be in eighth wildcard position on the Super Rugby ladder if they didn’t have the Jaguares and Kings in their conference?
Certainly the conference system as it was until last year disadvantaged the New Zealand teams, who on many occasions would give up a top finals place to Australian and South African teams that they would have earned on points playing tougher matches against other New Zealand teams.
Unfortunately if the Super Rugby finals placings until 2015 had been entirely merit based, Australia or South Africa would have missed out entirely and the competition would have lost its appeal in those countries.
It would have struggled to survive. The Kiwis compromise in the spirit of the game should be acknowledged.(Hear that beanhead)
However, where the old draw constituted a necessar y compromise, the new one appears to have been driven by the desire to include non SANZAR nations in the competition, which I consider to be a good thing. It also appears to be driven by South African political interests and abuse of commercial power, which is not a good thing.
Statistically giving South Africa teams more than twice the chance to get into the finals, plus other advantages compared to a New Zealand or Australian team, goes against the spirit of fair competition.
I see several potential ways to address this situation.
1. Include the Sunwolves and the Jaguares in the New Zealand and Australian conferences, for three conferences of six teams each
The advantage of this would be that each conference would only get one
conference leader and one wild card spot, so the competition would be
fair again.
The disadvantages include that the competition wouldn’t be much fun for the Sunwolves and Jaguares to begin with, and scheduling compromises would need to be made in order to avoid blowing out the length of the competition.
2. Australia and New Zealand breaks away from South Africa
and runs their own competition, including teams from Asia, the Americas
and potentially the Pacific
The advantages of this would be that the integrity of Super Rugby would
no longer be prisoner to South African rugby politics. It would replace
the large broadcast market in South Africa with even larger potential
markets in new regions.
Aside from the Japanese and Argentinean markets which are now served by Super Rugby, the US, Canada and the Pacific Islands are other potential bases for new teams.
3. South Africa stops insisting on having a sixth team and goes back to having a five-South African-team conference
Growth of the game could be addressed with three new teams from Asia,
the Pacific and/or the Americas, with all five non-SANZAR teams forming
their own conference and gaining one conference leader spot.
This would grow and add variety to the competition, while providing balanced development opportunities for new teams.
Whatever option was to be adopted, be it one of the above or something else, I am fairly certain that the need to accommodate South African demands which undermine the integrity of the competition.
I would hate to see a central nation in international rugby like South Africa leave Super Rugby. However, the people in charge of the game need to be confronted with the fact that they are not indispensable if they continue to insist on making unreasonable demands.
