Super Rugby Wanted To Go Global. Why Has It Shrunk?

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With the Melbourne Rebels kicked out of the competition, Super Rugby is left with fewer than 12 teams for the first time since the formation of SANZAR in 1995. This does not include the disrupted 2021 season, which had a whole host of unique challenges.

The current situation is a far cry from just a decade prior when ambitious expansion plans saw the competition looking to take over the rugby union playing world. Nothing went as planned and now Super Rugby finds itself back at the same place it started, perhaps even in a slightly worse position.

That hasn’t stopped officials from thinking about trying another round of global expansion, with these talks feeling eerily familiar. How did we get here and what does the future potentially hold for Super Rugby or Super Rugby Pacific or whatever they end up calling it in the future?

There have been some murmurings that have become full-blown rumblings that the Jaguares could return. It is welcome to hear but also fraught with complications. For starters, most of the original Super Rugby was disbanded. A foundation would need to be built up from close to scratch. Second, they would be almost farcically isolated from the rest of the teams. Realistically, you’d need to create an entirely new conference with other teams somewhat closer by.

That brings us back to the document mentioning a potential merger between the Rebels with Moana Pasifika. It also mentioned how Super Rugby was once again considering expansion to the USA. More than a decade after first mulling the idea, it is back on the organization’s radar.

There are reasons for optimism. The Super Rugby Commission now has a CEO in place, Jack Mesley, who comes over from the A League. The TV contract expires at the end of 2025. And the play itself wasn’t bad this season.

This could be a new dawn for Super Rugby that allows it to regain its form after a lost decade. Of course, many of us said the same thing at the start of the lost decade. Who knows what the future holds, but I, for one, am bullish.

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