The end of Super Rugby?
August 05 2008
The New Zealand Rugby Union (NZRU) and the Australian Rugby Union (ARU) have moved to rubbish reports about the potential end of Super Rugby.
Leading New Zealand provincial teams North Harbour, Wellington, Canterbury, Auckland, Waikato, Otago, Hawke's Bay, Taranaki and Southland rugby representatives were reported to have been meeting in recent weeks over a restructure and realignment of Southern Hemisphere and domestic rugby.
The unions wanted a new direction because they felt that the Super 14 competition had reached its use-by date, The Dominion Post said.
The group wanted to replace Super 14 with a trans-Tasman trophy home-and-away competition involving nine New Zealand teams and five from Australia.
This would mean doing away with New Zealand's premier domestic competition, the Air New Zealand Cup, as well.
They also want a European-style tournament to run alongside the trans-Tasman trophy which would then include teams from South Africa, New Zealand, Australia, Japan, the Pacific Islands and America.
This tournament would contain 24 teams in four pools of six playing matches every four weeks.
The NZRU will not back any push for a replacement of the Super 14 rugby competition that excludes South Africa.
The union's general manager of professional rugby, Neil Sorenson, told NZPAon Tuesday that such a restructure would be at odds with the union's preferred position at the moment.
SANZAR's Super 14 and Tri-Nations contract with News Limited does not end until 2011.
Renegotiation of the current deal would have to be brought forward so as to have the new competitions up and running in 2010, the report said.
"SANZAR's current position is that it is a very much a three-country expansion of Super Rugby with South Africa involved," Sorenson said.
"The trans-Tasman idea does not include South Africa and that is absolutely not the NZRU's preferred position at the moment.
"At this stage SANZAR are unified in New Zealand, Australia and South African teams being involved in Super rugby and Tri-Nations going forward.
"There can be no breakup of SANZAR, absolutely not.
"SANZAR needs to remain very, very strong, particularly in today's rugby environment which is very trying."
SANZAR had been re-committing over the last few months, had been meeting on a monthly basis and was probably closer and more unified as a group than it had ever been and needed to be in the next 24 months.
Sorenson said the NZRU had had a lot of options "thrown at us" from its provincial unions, the Super 14 franchises and former All Blacks such as Mike Brewer and John Drake.
"This one has been mooted before, we have been over some of these ideas over the last few weeks."
There was a meeting due on Friday to which the NZRU had been invited to attend but Sorenson was unsure if it was about this reported issue with the nine unions.
"There is nothing dead in the water at the moment because reviews are taking place over the next 12 months and we are happy for all options to be included, happy for any suggestions to come forward from any people whether it is players, sponsors, provincial unions or franchises," he said.
In addition, the ARU insists it is committed to Super Rugby transformation as the way forward for the SANZAR alliance.
"The understanding that I was briefed on this group's plans is incorrect," said ARU Managing Director and CEO John O'Neill.
O'Neill said he was casually handed a paper and did not read it for two days, adding that alternative competition structures "cross my desk all the time".
"Expanding Super Rugby is what the game needs," he said.
"There is no deviation from that aim."
Meanwhile, the NZRU's "final draft decision" on the future of the Air New Zealand Cup championship was due out on Wednesday and would be made public shortly afterwards.
Unions have until September 5 to give their feedback and the NZRU board will ratify and produce a final decision on September 25, Sorenson said.
Sorenson said the discussion document on the revamp of the Air New Zealand Cup was released three to four weeks ago and the inclusion of Australian teams was not part of the review.
"And we have had no feedback from partners and stake holders to suggest we should revisit that position," he said.