Global season a remedy for endless rugby

OPINION: On Thursday evening the Black Caps will swing the willow at AMI Stadium and 48 hours later the last of the Coast to Coast competitors will stagger across the Sumner finish line.

Toss cricket, endurance racing and the summer sun into sport's melting pot and what do you get? Of course – the rugby season.

In just five days the Crusaders confront the Highlanders on a field still bearing the scars created by New Zealand and Bangladesh in their one-day international, and the arena will host cricket again when the Aussies suit up for their Twenty20 match on February 28.

By that date the Crusaders, if all goes well, should have already pocketed competition points from their opening matches against the Highlanders, Queensland Reds and Sharks and be preparing for their fourth-round match against the Blues on March 6.

Everyone, apart from those blessed with oval-shaped brains or an incurable fetish for the 15-man game, agrees the Super 14 starts too soon – although finding a solution to the malaise continues to stonker even the sharpest of minds in the administrative web that circles the globe.

Originally cooked up as a winter code, rugby is now a marathon that begins in summer and staggers through to late spring.

So, while the Six Nations began last weekend with the Poms slugging Wales 30-17 in front of 81,406 chilly fans in the gloom of Twickenham, southern hemisphere fans have been poking their sausages on their barbecues and pondering whether the rugby season will ever return to being just that – a season. The truth is no-one really seems to have an answer.

The New Zealand Rugby Union (NZRU) and their Australian counterparts tried to convince Sanzar partners South Africa to start the Super 14 in March, but they refused as part of their protection programme of their domestic Currie Cup.

The obvious answer to this pickle is a global season.

But the administrators at the top end of the planet are quite happy with their Six Nations programme and the Heineken Cup, a knockout competition that comprises the best clubs from Ireland, Britain and Europe and generates the sort of revenue and attracts fan numbers that can only be dreamed of here.

Then there are the powerful European clubs to negotiate with and such privately owned operations are in no mood to allow them to take a financial hit for the good of the game.

The code is professional; it is all about egos and money.

Somewhere in all this is the International Rugby Board. Its ability to get anything done has been as swift as a snail swimming through wet concrete.

The NZRU can keep poking the IRB's most sensitive places to prevent them from nodding off to the global season issue, but they lack the clout or support to make it work. At least they succeeded in demanding France showed some respect – which was sadly lacking in previous seasons – by sending a strong squad Down Under last year. That the ultimatum resulted in the All Blacks being beaten in Carisbrook in the first test was not the point.

New Zealanders were sick of the European unions treating our winter tests as a joke and the NZRU at least won some respect on that point. This winter it will be Ireland and Wales' turn to play ball.

And so another season rolls on. Grab your towelling hat and slap on the sunscreen.

The Super 14 starts Friday.

- © Fairfax NZ News