Try as I may, I just can't find the love. The Super Rugby Conference system just doesn't spin my wheels.

The fact is, the New Zealand teams won't be rewarded appropriately for being the best sides in the competition. Back when the conference system was first proposed, many supporters held up the example of the NBA and how well it works in basketball. (How amazing have the playoffs been ?!) 

This isn't the USA. The conference system is a well established part of the American sporting culture and psyche. But it's not a part of the rugby culture. The majority of us are struggling to buy-in.

So while we all moan and grizzle about the system and the prospect of perhaps even further expansion. I'm not hearing too many coming up with ideas on how to make it work. I'll have a go!

First things first: I want a competition where all sides get to play each other. Can't happen ya reckon ? Exhibit A: The English Premier League. Quite simply, a good old fashioned round robin! It comes at a cost though- no playoffs, no final! Calm down - before you start trolling me, it doesn't end there!

Again I look to English Football. The good old FA Cup. A knockout competition. The obvious question on most peoples lips will be "how the hell are you gonna fit all that in?" Not an unreasonable question. The first thing you do is you seed the top four teams from the previous year's "Premier League" (working title) straight through to the quarter finals. Simple as that.

The other sides all play knockout rounds, with the bottom teams from the previous year first having to play qualifiers to make the main draw. Instead of the traditional pre-season games, those matches become the first rounds of the FA Cup (yes- another working title !). In other words, it won't add to the season.

If you look at the current calendar and then crunch some numbers with these ideas to compare, I reckon it could be a goer. What are the impacts at franchise level?

Squad sizes would need to increase, or at the very least, bigger backup squads would be needed. If you look at the English football model, so often the better sides, very deep into the competition, still rest their top players through the FA Cup. At least until the semi finals or final, and that's why there are often sides playing in the final who you wouldn't expect to see there.

Managing player workloads is one of the key skills needed by Super Rugby coaches now, so it's nothing new. The one downside is the potential to punish winning sides with more difficult travel schedules.

Even within this structure, trophies could be dished out for the best sides in New Zealand, Australia, and South Africa (not sure what you do with Japan and Argentina here though). As I said before, I want to see all sides playing each other. This model achieves that, and more. At the moment, I'm really loving the rugby, but intensely disliking the tournament which is about as palatable as an onion milkshake.

 

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