Ulster hopes hit as PRO14 shakes up season’s end

ULSTER’S hopes of making knockout rugby in the PRO14 look to have suffered an unexpected blow following the shakeup of the league season to create the cross-hemisphere Rainbow Cup.

The existing PRO14 campaign will now wrap up in March to allow the four former South African Super Rugby franchises, the Bulls, Stormers, Lions and Sharks to be brought into the new 16-team competition.

With the Rainbow Cup due to kick-off in April – though this plan will clearly be pandemic permitting – the existing PRO14 season will now be concluded after its round 16 by having no playoff games and moving straight to a final between the winners of Conference A and B.

Ulster will now have to finish ahead of holders Leinster in Conference A to make the shoot-out for silverware against the winners of Conference B who look likely to be Munster.

Though Ulster are currently three points in front of Leinster, they have played eight games while the southern province, who are favourites to finish top, have taken all 35 points available to them from the seven games they have played.

However, as some of the concluding rounds of the PRO14 clash with the planned Six Nations dates, this could yet assist Dan Mcfarland’s side should they be less disrupted by international call-ups.

The curtailed PRO14 season now makes Ulster’s eight remaining games crucial.

Ulster are expected to prioritise topping Conference A as knockout rugby in the also s l i mmed- d own Cha mpi o n s Cup now looks beyond them — though a place in the Challenge Cup might yet be available.

Next season’s European qualification will be decided by the top rankings after round 16 of this campaign’s curtailed PRO14.

The Rainbow Cup is due to be played between April 17 and June 19 and involve two groups of eight teams — the 12 current PRO14 squads and the four South African franchises — with the winners from each group going forward to the final.

The new competition comes in advance of the scheduled British and Irish Lions tour to South Africa and has been planned, as such, to provide the Springboks’ home-based players with valuable game-time ahead of the tour.

The Rainbow Cup should also provide a boost of much-needed revenue streams for the cashstrapped game though, again, the situation will be entirely dependent on whether the coronavirus is under control both in the northern and southern hemisphere.

The Cup could also likely be the prelude to the already widely rumoured permanent involvement of the four South African teams in an expanded PRO16 for next season.

Reacting to the announcement, PRO14 CEO Martin Anayi said: “With a Lions tour in South Africa to come it is hard to think of anything better than the best players from the Celtic regions competing against World Cup-winning Springboks in the Guinness PRO14 Rainbow Cup.”

“The inclusion of South Africa’s ‘Super’ teams in the Rainbow Cup is a watershed moment for South African rugby,” said Jurie Roux, CEO of SA Rugby.