Format for URC and what it means for Scottish clubs
Plans have been unveiled for the United Rugby Championship, a new competition that will feature the four South African Super Rugby franchises and 12 clubs from the Guinness Pro14.
The 16-team league, forged from an agreement between Pro14 Rugby and SA Rugby, replaces the Pro14 and will start in September. Here’s how it will work and what it means for Edinburgh:
League format explained The competition involves 16 teamsacrossfiveterritoriesbut thereisanelementofregionalisation in the format.
Although final positions will be decided by a single league table, teams are also divided into four regional pools, as follows:.
Italian&scottishpool:benettonrugby,edinburgh,glasgow Warriors, Zebre
Irishpool:connacht,leinster, Munster, Ulster
Welsh Pool: Dragons, Cardiff Rugby, Ospreys, Scarlets
South African Pool: Cell C Sharks, DHL Stormers, Emirates Lions and Vodacom Bulls
There will be 18 rounds of fixtures in the regular season. They comprise six home and away fixtures played by each teamintheirpool.theremaining 12 games will be made from an even number of home or away games against the other teams in the league.
So Edinburgh and Glasgow will play each other twice and each play Benetton and Zebre twice. The Scottish pro sides willthenfacetheother12teams once only.
The play-offs
After 18 rounds of games, the top eight teams will qualify for the quarter-finals, followed by semi-finals and a final. Teams will be seeded 1 to 8 and receive home advantage according to their seeding.
So the quarter-final fixtures wouldbe:1stv8th,2ndv7th,3rd v 6th, 4th v 5th.
The URC Grand Final venue will be decided later.
No clashes with international weekends
The format means that, compared to the Pro14, the number of regular season games is reduced from 21 to 18. The benefit of this is that there is no crossover with international weekends. That will be a huge boost for Edinburgh and Glasgow who have the biggest concentration of international
players in their squad.
Qualifying for “Europe”
Thisisarguablythemostradical change. The winner of each pool will qualify for the Champions Cup followed by the next highest ranked teams in the main league table. Fom the 2022-23 season, South African teams will be able to enter the Championscupiftheyhavefinishedinthequalificationplaces intheurcstandingsin2021-22. Regional pool mechanics will ensure at least one team from South Africa will qualify.
What does new competitionmeanforscottishclubs? Having more access to their Scotland players is a huge boost for Edinburgh and Glasgow respectively. The season just ended has been hugely tryingforbothduetotheextended international season and Covid restrictions. One potential downside is that the involvement of four top South African sides will make qualifying for the Champions Cup more difficult for the Scottish clubs.
Ali Price insists that he has put the euphoria of Lions selection behind him and is now firmly focused on fighting for a place in the tourists’ Test team this summer.
The Glasgow scrum-half is at the Lions’ training camp in Jersey as the countdown continues to next weekend’s warm-up match against Japan at Murrayfield - a game he is targeting as the first chance to prove he should be in the No 9 jersey for the three-test series against the Springboks.
“No-one is here to make up the numbers, and I would be lying if I said I was just happy to be here,” said Price, one of eight Scots in Warren Gatland’s squad for the trip to South Africa. “Everyone is happy to be here, but we want to be involved as much as we can.
“Those three games at the end of the tour are what we’re all gunning for. When the games start coming and squads are being selected everyone is competitive, and it is just about taking opportunities when you get them in the games.”
That was precisely the message to Price and the other Scots from national coach Gregor Townsend and assistant coach Mike Blair, both of whom want their players to make the most of this possibly unique chance to play at the highest level of the world game.
“Gregor rang all the Scottish boys shortly after the announcement and congratulated us and told us just to do what we've been doing for Scotland,” Price explained.
“He said ‘Don't shy away from any opportunity that you are given’.
“I got a great message from Mike Blair as well. He said it was brilliant I had been selected, but not just to be satisfied with that. You're there because you're one of the best three (scrum-halves, along with Ireland’s Conor Murray and Wales’ Gareth Davies) and it's for you to go and make the most of the tour.”
While Stuart Hogg and Finn
Russell among others are still with their clubs as they prepare for the end-of-season play-offs in England and France, Price and 25 of his fellow squad members have settled down at their Jersey base as they prepare for the Japan match on Saturday 26th.
The 28-year-old knows that this fortnight could see him get his tour off to a flying start by being selected for the match in Edinburgh, and he is particularly keen to be involved as a
crowd of about 16,500 will be allowed into the national stadium.
“I've just got to put my best foot forward in training over the next couple of weeks,” he added. “It's massive for the Scottish players to try and get themselves involved in the 23 for the Japan game up in Edinburgh.
“Our friends and family will be able to come and watch. It's a big carrot at the end of these two weeks.
“I'm really looking forward to it. I've seen a few games in the Premiership where they have started to get three or four thousand back in stadiums. It does make a massive difference to the energy of the place.
“Watching the football starting now, having fans back, it just creates a buzz around the place.
"As players you can feed off that. There's nothing better, to be honest.”
Scottish Professional Football League chief executive Neil Doncaster is hopeful that Scottish football can benefit from a similar increase in crowds to those in England.
Although England's 'road to freedom' from Covid restrictions was delayed on Monday, it was later announced that the Wimbledon finals would be played in front of capacity crowds next month.
Wembley is set to be half full for the latter stages of Euro 2020, double the 21,000 crowd set to attend Scotland's clash with England this week. Hampden was less than a quarter full for Scotland's defeat by Czech Republic and Murrayfield will work under similar rules with 16,500 set to watch the British and Irish Lions take on Japan later this month.
SPFL clubs survived last season with only a handful of games played in front of crowds of several hundred, but only thanks to donations and Scottish Government loans/grants, as well as the patience and financial commitment of season ticket holders.
Doncaster said: "I'm certainly hopeful that, as every day passes and more of the population get vaccinated, clearly that improves our prospects of being able to get fans back in stadia in decent numbers. It was a real privilege to be at Hampden on Monday. You could see the excitement of so many fans who were desperate to get back to watching live football.
"If you look at what's happening south of the border, they are ramping up the attendance at Wembley. But, clearly, financially it's very important that fans return as soon as possible.”
It is not known if Ange Postecoglou is a card player.
Should Celtic’s new manager be so inclined, it is possible to imagine him casting his eyes over the newly-relased Premiership fixtures, and wondering if he is being stiffed by bottom-of-the-deck dealing. Across his first five weeks of competitive football at the helm, the Greek-australian will be forced to play with the sort of hand you can lose your house on.
The 55-year-old, wherever he is currently residing ahead of the squad returning for preseason training next week, will discover exactly the stakes at play when this morning in Nyon the draw is made for the Champions League second qualifying round with which his era will begin in earnest. Rapid Vienna, Galatasaray or FC Midtjylland will be his first competitive opponents for the July 20/21 first leg, with the return a week later. In light of their historic issues previously negotiating the more favourable champions route across the past nine years – a period which covers three managerial tenures and brought five qualifying exits – it would be fair to say a settled Celtic would require to pull out a few aces to ensure progress. Right now, with the squad in a complete state of flux, it feels as if Postecoglou will need a royal flush to fall in his lap.
The Parkhead club bounce from this tie straight into a Premiership opener away to Tynecastle. Game four of their title tilt takes them to Ibrox. These two grounds have borne witness to their heaviest domestic defeats in the past decade. Never mind that Rangers are on their longest unbeaten run – a six-game sequence – against their ancient adversaries in almost nine years. And that Steven Gerrard’s men blitzed the league championship by a 25-point margin through remaining unbeaten throughout the top flight campaign.
Postecoglou will have to avoid losing ground in the title race during an exacting opening month while also targeting continental progress. If not in the Champions League, then the Europa League. If not in the Europa League, then the Conference League. Even that isn’t all. On August 14, Celtic will have their first tie in the newly-branded Premier Cup, the League Cup by a sponsors’ name. Their ruination last season was accelerated through losing at this second round entry point; a defeat at home to Ross County halting a remarkable monopoly of domestic honours that stretched back to 2016.
Celtic supporters who live in constant fear of the very worst happening – which is all too many of them – already are very much alive to the doomsday scenario to which next season’s scheduling potentially gives rise. Within his first 11 games, it is possible Postecoglou,
inset, effectively could be out of five competitions. Four – three European tournaments and the League Cup – indisputably. Any stumbles in the cinch Premiership, meanwhile, would hardly make it a cinch for them to play catch-up on a Rangers team having their time.
The bullish 55-year-old will have no truck with such gloomy analysis, of course. Those who know him well, and the man himself, have repeatedly said he relishes beingbackedintoacornerand having to stick it to doubters. And, it ought to be acknowledged, he did precisely that with South Melbourne, Brisbane Roar, the Australian national team and, most recently, Yokohama F Marinos. That represents a fair old track record of wriggling his way out of tight spots.
Postecoglou gave a hint as to how he intends to extricate himself from the invidious situation he is walking into at Celtic during his interview with the club’s media that was released as soon as his appointment was confirmed five days ago. “I’m going to set us off in a new direction and people have got to believe in me more than anything else,” he said in reference to turning Celtic around. “Anything I say or do beyond that will be fruitless if they don’t believe in me as a person and that will be my first task to make sure everyoneunderstandsmeasquickly as possible.”
The very fact Postecoglou’s playing strategy – a highintensity, possession game designed for full-on attack – isn’t so far removed from that patented by Brendan Rodgers suggests there may not be as much remodelling of the current players’ mindset as has been claimed. Moreover, there is one other means by which you make yourself the man in the eyes of players under your charge: you be the man who places them there.
Sources in Sunderland have intimated that a deal for the League One club’s striker Charlie Wyke is in the offing. The move would bring in a bustling 28-year-old who bagged 30 goals last season. On Postecoglou’s shopping list is also reported to be Aaron Mooy. The Australian midfielder, currently at Shanghai SIGP, enjoyed his best years in the international set-up under the new Celtic manager. An aggressive ball-winner, he could be seen as the natural heir to the now departed club icon Scott Brown. New arrival Liam Shaw, who has joined up on a free contract from Sheffield Wednesday, is raw but
does possess the physicality Celtic lacked – among countless other facets – last season.
Even with Odsonne Edouard and Kristoffer Ajer on their way out, and even with holes in the team created by the departures of a number of loanees from last season, Celtic could still have a semblance of a squad as long as Postecoglou is backed with new signings in the coming days. The chips are down for the club, but the Greek-australian doesn’t appear the sort to fold.
Sometimes it feels necessary to appreciate skill when you see it, whatever the circumstances.
One such occasion was at Hampden on Monday afternoon while I watched a ball sail nearly 50 yards through the air into the net. I surprised myself with my reaction.
It wasn’t despondency, as I expected to feel when watching Scotland go 2-0 down on their home turf in such a high-profile game.
That did set in with time. But initially it was “wow”.
What a privilege to witness such an audacious piece of skill.
With this confession I realise I must count my Tartan Army membership as cancelled.
But why let partisanship get in the way of admiration for one of the truly great goals?
And I count Patrik Schick’s effort for Czech Republic as one of them.
Goalkeeper David Marshall – who is already the subject of a number of internet memes – will have to bear the cross, but it didn’t do too much damage to Wimbledon keeper Neil Sullivan’s career when he was the fall guy for David Beckham’s famous lob –
from all of 57 yards – in 1996.
I have been so fortunate to have seen many memorable goals as they happened.
Zinedine Zidane’s volley into the same Hampden net at the Champions League final in 2002 is one.
That was a work of art which
I have managed to avoid seeing again since watching it with naked eye.
The memory of it being scored in real time lends it an extra majesty in my mind.
Ryan Giggs’ solo effort for Manchester Utd against Arsenal in their FA Cup semi-final replay at Villa Park is another. Also Michael Owen’s equally fine solo effort in St Etienne for England against Argentina at the 1998 World Cup.
Then there’s then Dundee midfielder Morten Wieghorst’s outrageous curling strike against Hearts in a Coca-cola Cup quarter final against Hearts in 1995. Schick’s is just the latest to add to the list.
His wonder strike meant the Scots had to score three times to secure the win that so many seemed to expect they would gain from their opening Group D game.
It all but consigned my team, my country, to defeat.
But part of me was glad that it happened.
What a strike.