“Rugby was chasing a foothold in the Asian market and now, six months before the first Rugby World Cup in Asia, we’ve got the announced termination of the only side on the continent.” - Jake White Volume 19, Number 10 28 March 2019 Register to receive your own free weekly newsletter at www.leopardnewsletters.co.za

A Weekend of Upsets in Super Rugby

Super Rugby started with a bang this weekend as the managed their first win against kiwi opposition since round one in 2016. The lead changed hands throughout and it was probably a late yellow card for the visitors that swung the balance, as it did three years ago. Final score 33-26.

The early game on Saturday saw the entertain the in Wellington. The visitors had a real shot but lost it in the last quarter: 34-28.

Next came the first real upset of the weekend: Also on Saturday, in the second upset of the Waratahs beating the table topping . It was weekend, the high-flying were on the end of a a result nobody with any rugby knowledge would thrashing by the at Loftus. Even the normally have predicted and it still has our editor scratching vociferous Naas Botha was rendered virtually his head, even now, almost a week later. speechless by the final score: 20-56.

Then the Lions kicked off against the Sunwolves at The final match on Saturday was also the third upset the Japanese franchise’s alternate venue in of the weekend when the top Australian franchise, . It was a bit of a tussle initially but the the Rebels, were unable to put the away in visitors took control early in the second half and Durban. It was a missed opportunity to take five never relinquished it. Final score: 24-37. points from their road trip. And on Sunday morning, the Reds consolidated their previous week’s win in by handing out a rugby lesson to their compatriots from Canberra. The visiting responded to the first score by the Reds but couldn’t sustain the effort and went down 36-14 after 80 minutes.

KEY TOPICS IN THIS NEWSLETTER

Sunwolves Are Toast After Next Year Making the Great Again Real Rugby Trumps Big Bucks - Jake Six-team playoffs: Yes or No? Gold Cup is into the Knock Out Stage Loftus Hiding a Timely Reality Check

Page 1 Sunwolves Are Toast After Next Year Real Rugby Trumps Big Bucks - Jake

Last week, rumours of the Sunwolves being axed from Our editor’s old school mate and former Springbok Super Rugby resurfaced in the Australian media along coach, Jake White, has penned a piece on AllOutRugby with allegations that the decision was pushed by SA this week that offers a dash of reality to the debate Rugby because the Japanese had supported France to over the pending exit of the Sunwolves from Super host the 2023 World Cup. While that certainly Rugby. wouldn't have made any friends in , it turns out that the real reasons are financial.

Firstly, the Rugby Football Union made it known to SANZAAR in March that it planned to withdraw its financial support for the Sunwolves because it no longer views the competition as vital to the development of Japanese rugby. Since the franchise itself lacks the necessary financial backing, that left the ball in SANZAAR’s half of the pitch.

The organisation that administers Super Rugby then approached the franchise requesting a non-negotiable participation fee of about 1 billion yen ($9 million) per year to stay in the competition. As an aside, rugby fan He contends that while the inclusion on the Japanese DJ Rossouw reminded us on Twitter that SA Rugby side in the competition in 2016 seemed like a good pays around R75million (€4.6 million) per season for idea at the time, it didn’t really work. “The main the country’s two PRO14 teams. reason administrators took rugby down that road was because they thought there was money to be made. Nevertheless, SANZAAR appears bound and Rugby was chasing a foothold in the Asian market and determined to axe the Japanese team from the now, six months before the first Rugby World Cup in competition, something which the Sunwolve’s chief Asia, we’ve got the announced termination of the only executive, Yuji Watase, says will damage efforts to Super Rugby side on the continent.” grow the sport in Asia. White insists that what the Sunwolves experiment has As a result, from 2021 Super Rugby will return to a 14 shown is that it doesn’t work like that. “The Japanese team round-robin format, scrapping the unpopular need to develop their own regional rugby market and conference system. produce more home-grown heroes before trying to step up to Super Rugby,” he contends.

And he does have a point. A glance down the team sheet for last weekend’s clash against the Lions shows far fewer home-grown Japanese players than might have been expected more than three years down the line.

If we ignore, for a moment, the naturalised Japanese citizens involved, only six Japanese nationals were in the starting 15 on Saturday with another five were on the bench, meaning that only half of the match-day 22 appear to have been Japanese by birth.

Page 2 Page 3 Varsity Cup: A Draw and a Trio of Thumpings Gold Cup is into the Knock Out Stage

The first match this past Monday featured the high- Last Saturday saw the last round of the pool stages of flying Tuks in Pretoria hosting a UCT Ikeys side that the 2019 SSG Gold Cup club rugby competition. The has struggled to put together 80 minutes of good rugby results were as follows: all season. But it was a real test for the home side when they found themselves 0-26 down at half-time. Pool A: Northam Platinum Rhinos 46-21 Stiles Progress The second was half interrupted by lightning and play George OneLogix United Bulk Villagers Worcester resumed with some 32 minutes remaining with Tuks 20-59 Durbanville-Bellville still not on the scoreboard. The home side then almost pulled a Lions-like comeback but had to settle for a Pool B: 26-all draw, which provided the two points needed to Phakisa Holdings East Rand United 32-37 Multisure be sure of a home semi-final. Gardens Sasol Digi Mag Secunda 17-27 College Rovers The other televised game of the day was Shimlas at home to the unbeaten Maties. From the start, the Pool C: visitors looked like rolling right over the home team Recall Security Bloemfontein Police 0-64 ABE but Shimlas had other ideas. Brilliant defence kept Midas Naka Bulls them in touch during the first half and took them to the Welkom 27-15 CT Hydraulics Sishen break with the score 0-10. Pool D: But dogged defence early in the second half by the Hollywoodbets Swallows 53-21 Rototank visitors kept the home team from scoring a potential 9- Roodepoort point try (the move began in their own half). From the KWV Springs 29-63 Newrak Rustenburg Impala clearing kick, a lapse in defence let Maties in for a third try, after which Shimlas were always chasing the As a result, this weekend will see the first knock-out game in vain, especially in the last twenty when round of competition as the teams that finished first Maties opened the floodgates. Final score: 14-59. and second in their groups duke it out for a place in next weekend’s semifinals. Elsewhere this week, NWU-Pukke visited Bellville and put CUT to the sword (7-55) to solidify the claim The first quarter-final kicks of at 12:20 on Saturday on a semifinal spot while Wits did a similar demolition as a curtain raiser to the local Super Rugby derby job on UWC (74-40) in Braamfontein to stay in with between the Sharks and the Bulls at Kings Park. It just a sniff of the fourth semifinal spot. But sealing the features College Rovers and Durbanville-Bellville deal will probably require a win in Pochefstroom next (Durbell). week and for Shimlas to stumble against UJ in The other three all kick off at 16:00 as follows: Johannesburg. Northam Platinum Rhinos vs Multisure Gardens at the Northam Recreation Club, in Setaria just south of Thabazimbi

Rustenburg Impala vs Welkom at the Impala Rugby Club in Rustenburg

ABE Midas Naka Bulls vs Hollywoodbets Swallows at the Hannes Fourie Sportgrounds in Wonderboom, Pretoria

Page 4 Page 5 Making the Southern Kings Great Again Six-team playoffs: Yes or No?

With the Sunwolves destined for the exit door in Super Rugby (see page 2), the competition is heading for some major changes come 2021. Along with the abolition of the conference system, SANZAAR has also opted to move away from conventional semis and a final to a system that gives the top six teams on the ladder an opportunity to win the cup.

The league phase of the competition in 2021 will lead into a three-week finals series between the top six teams, with the top two waiting at home for a semi- A couple of weeks ago, news emerged of an Eastern final against the winners of 3 v 6 and 4 v 5. There are Cape consortium acquiring ownership of the Southern pros and cons and AllOutRugby has a fascinating Kings. We weren’t quite sure what to make of it analysis of the merits and demerits of such a format. because the name of the acquiring company made us suspect a prank: The Greatest Rugby Company in the Featuring Tank Lanning against the revision and Zelím Whole Wide World (Pty) Ltd. Nel arguing in favour of the new structure, the “debate” raises some fascinating points. But it turns out it’s not a prank and the company, GRC for short, has acquired a 74% shareholding in SA Tank reckons the six team finals series goes against Super Rugby (Pty) Ltd, the Southern Kings' holding everything that was once good about Super Rugby. company, from SA Rugby. The Eastern Province “After 15 weeks of competition...we now want close (EPRU) acquired the remaining of 26% on half of them to be given another bite at the cherry in of the shares. a new, three-week comp? A three-week comp that is so massively biased to the teams seeded one and two, The owners of GRC are Eastern Cape businesspeople it is almost farcical.” Loyiso Dotwana, Gary Markson, Rory Stear, Kenny Govender and Vuyo Zitumane. Dotwana, head of the Zelím argues that Super Rugby is not a balanced consortium, is on record as saying that GRC’s mission competition and that a wider playoff series throws is to “make the Kings great again”. South Africa a bone. “Coaching in South Africa is significantly tougher than it is in or In a recent podcast interview with Rugby365 and, after almost 25 years in a lopsided managing editor, Jan de Koning, he elaborated on the competition, I can live with a playoff series that plans insofar as talent retention is concerned. He also favours the Republic.” Check out the full “debate” here suggested the Kings would be focusing fully on . PRO14 and would look for sponsors and a base of operations in the northern hemisphere for future seasons of the competition.

The plans have been met with enthusiasm by the EPRU, as was indicated by the comments of that organisations president, Andre Rademan. "It is essential that the continuum between school, club, provincial and franchise rugby remains open and this new arrangement assures that," he said.

As committed rugby fans we look forward to seeing more competitive local participation in PRO14 and would be delighted to see these plans succeed.

Page 6 Loftus Hiding a Timely Reality Check

When you’re riding high on top of your conference Cardinelli continues: “The level of capitulation was table, there’s nothing quite like a 50-point thrashing unforgivable. The Bulls have fared poorly against New by an unfancied team that, before the match, was Zealand teams in recent seasons – especially away last in its own conference. Well, that’s what from home. At the very least, one would have expected happened to the Bulls on Saturday and Jon this side, which has shown some signs of progress, to Cardinelli has analysed the performance, if that’s go down fighting at home. One would have expected what it deserves to be called. the form team in South Africa to show some pride.

“And so here we are, picking through the wreckage “As it was, the game had already begun to slip away of another heavy defeat to a New Zealand side. Just from the Bulls in the first half. Instead of getting to when we thought that the Bulls had moved on from their feet and hitting back, the Bulls curled up into a the dark days of 2017 and 2018, they have been ball and waited for the beating to reach its conclusion.” handed a brutal reality check. There’s more, much more but he also has a few choice “Pote Human delivered a scathing assessment of words for the Stormers, who also fared badly on his side’s performance. The Bulls coach spoke Saturday: “Less was expected of the Stormers this calmly when addressing the media on Saturday season due to their problems off the field. They weren’t night, and yet words like ‘humiliation’ revealed the expected to beat the Hurricanes in Wellington this past mood in the changing room in the wake of a 56-20 Saturday, and yet there were aspects of their loss.” performance that rankled.

“The Hurricanes opted to rest All Blacks of the quality of Dane Coles, TJ Perenara and Ngani Laumape for the Stormers fixture. The absence of Laumape alone was significant. The robust centre has been the standout at the gainline this season, and has scored five tries.”

As Cardinelli concludes: “The South African rugby collective is still fighting to regain the reputation it lost in the wake of the 2016 and 2017 seasons. Recent performances, even more so than the results, have done nothing to aid that cause.”

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Page 7 For your weekend viewing pleasure

My Ultimate Rugby app is showing another relatively busy rugby weekend beginning on Friday with two Super Rugby matches in the morning and another four on Saturday (see schedule alongside). Also on Saturday are three fixtures in the European Champions Cup and two American MLR matches (both competitions also have Sunday fixtures and the MLR programme extends to Monday).

On top of that the local club rugby season is still in full swing with the Gold Cup featuring the quarter-finals on Saturday (see page four) and various universities and other institutions of higher learning contesting different competitions in Varsity Cup on Monday – check out the Varsity Sports app for those details.

We’ll focus on Super Rugby as usual. The conference- topping Lions have a bye this weekend while the Stormers are still on their road trip down under, visiting Auckland to play the Blues on Saturday morning. Later in the day, the Bulls will be in Durban expecting to bounce back from the terrible performance last week.

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