DURBAN – The general consensus of bloating Super Rugby to a massive 18 teams in 2016 was that there were more negatives than positives for all involved. Additionally, some overarching damage seems to have been caused, say some key rugby figures.
The current England coach, and former Reds and Australian boss Eddie Jones has called for the cutting of two Australian teams for the betterment of the Wallabies, and at the same time, World Cup-winning Springbok flyhalf Joel Stransky has proposed the same thing in South Africa.
Sanzaar themselves have grudgingly admitted the new confusing and convoluted system of groups and conferences, as well as additional teams from Argentina and Japan, put in place last year, has been a failure.
There was a large meeting at the conclusion of the season in which franchise chief executives and coaches debated what needs to take place going forward.
The message, although not codified, was that they had gone too far with 18 teams and it should probably be trimmed back.
Despite the damage extending a competition like Super Rugby beyond its capacity does to franchise rugby, and itself as a business model, the likes of Jones and Stransky maintain it has a direct effect on the country’s national teams.
Jones would see the likes of the Western Force and the Rebels cut from the roster in order to strengthen the remaining Reds, Waratahs and Brumbies.
The premise of adding more teams, especially for Australia, when creating the Rebels and Force was to expose more players to top-level rugby, but this has been a bit of a red herring.
Fewer teams would lead to fewer players in the top-flight, no doubt, but those who remained would have to work harder and be better just to make it into a squad at Super Rugby level.
“The reason Australia wanted to have more than the three Super Rugby teams was to create extra depth, so the immediate question that needs to be answered is, has having those two extra teams strengthened the Wallabies?” Jones told stuff.co.nz
“If they have, then keep them. If they haven’t, then they’ve got to look at whether they should persevere with them or not.
“I’ve always said Australia is best to have the three teams and the best players playing with each other.
“That creates hot competition to get into Super Rugby and adds extra to everything that happens in Australian rugby.
"The Force and the Rebels have done some good things, but I don’t think it’s added considerably to Australian rugby at the moment. They’ve got to really question whether they continue with them.”
This comes off the back of a dreadful year for the Wallabies, who won six out of 15 games, including three losses to the All Blacks. No Australian team featured in the Super Rugby semi-finals. However, if the Wallabies had a poor year, the Springboks broke the bank.
Stransky called for the axing of two of South Africa’s six teams after the Springboks’ shock 20-18 loss to Italy during the November internationals.
Stransky believes diluting the pool of players is creating a culture where competition and winning does not come first.
“We need to understand that we can’t compete with six Super Rugby franchises,” he told New Zealand Radio Sport.
“We’d probably be at our best with four... if we want to be strong in the future, we need strong domestic rugby.
"With all due respect to Bloemfontein and Port Elizabeth, there’s not the crowd support and financial support to sustain the teams.
“We’ve got to make the right decisions for the Springboks, not the individual (administrators) running the game.”
Whether Jones and Stransky are right – in terms of the knock-on effect of shrinking Super Rugby and rebuilding intense competition – remains to be seen, but what is for sure is that Super 18 is not a viable long-lasting option.
The brainstrust behind the competition do have a duty to the national teams of the participating countries, but they also need Super Rugby to be compelling and attractive to pure rugby loving audiences – and only strong and competitive rugby will do that.