Currie Cup will be a one-round affair this season

A SHORTENED Currie Cup competition this year will see teams take on each other in a single-round format, a concept that SA Rugby CEO Jurie Roux believes will “increase crowd attendances and viewership”.

The competition will kick off on August 17, with the final to take place on October 27.

Defending Currie Cup champions Western Province, the Blue Bulls, Sharks, Golden Lions, Free State Cheetahs, Griquas and Pumas will again go head-to-head in the Premier Division.

The competition was contested in a double-round format last year, with the seven teams playing twice against each other, once home and once away. THE STATUS quo has been restored with Mamelodi Sundowns winning their eighth PSL title, adding another feather to Pitso Mosimane’s cap.

The season may not have come to the same climactic end as last year, but what it certainly did not lack in surprises.

The log received a bit of a reshuffle during this campaign with defending champions Bidvest Wits finding themselves at the lower half of the table while perennial challengers SuperSport United missed the relegation battle by the skin of their teeth. Kudos to Benni McCarthy on his first foray into a first-team management, leading Cape Town

City to a creditable fifth place on the league table.

Orlando Pirates made an impressive turnaround from last season’s 11th place on the log to challenge for the title, finishing second from the top.

But all credit should go to Mosimane and his charges for showing immense consistency over the past few seasons.

Too often players had to be escorted off during the season due to threatening fan behaviour.

Do South African sports fans need to go for anger management? And here we thought watching sport released dopamine.

As one season ends it allows us to reflect and do better than the last one both as fans and teams. OKAY, but it’s not what I wanted.

After the 2016/17 season, you’d think that this iteration of the PSL season would have been a rip-roaring, gut-punching,

Clubber Lang uppercut to the status quo.

Instead, it devolved into the obvious, the limpwristed plot-twist, the same-old, same-old.

Bidvest Wits, the promised ones, the would-be kings and paupers become princes, champions of 2017, imploded, leaving a trial of their guts spread across the fields of South

Africa as they got their snot klapped out of them in the first half of the season.

At first it was quite amusing, watching them squeal, but as the year progressed it became much more alarming. ‘Doomed to drop’ was the verdict, but instead they finished a quite embarrassing 12th, one below SuperSport United, which says much about the Clever Boys’ misadventures.

At least we had Orlando Pirates and

Kaizer Chiefs putting up something of a fight, or so it seemed. So, yay, Sundowns galloped to the championship again – a yawn but thoroughly deserved in the end.

What isn’t deserved is any plaudits to be given to the custodians of the game. The PSL once again showed that it is run by the clubs.

So, when Chiefs’ fans run amok at Moses

Mabhida Stadium last month, we got a flimsy press statement rather than a rock-solid response condemning, fining and banning.

Apparently, there is also a Nedbank Cup final this weekend, but then again, that’s just speculation, so poor has been its buildup ...