Rugby: Test format battle looming

Sanzar nations say northern teams, such as the British and Irish Lions, may send weakened sides to the June tests and fans' interest will suffer. Photo / Getty Images

Far from ushering in an era of contentment, the revamped June window may be about to launch one of the bigger battles of the professional age.

The respective player unions of New Zealand, Australia and South Africa have been left cold by the decision to play three-test series in June. They don't see it as being the right format to engage players and fans.

Having fought so hard to shape Super15 and the Four Nations into competitions players want to be part of, the shambolic June situation irks the associations.

They fear it's such a poor offering, even with the three test series, that it seriously weakens the overall proposition. They want something else for June - quite what, they are not sure yet.

With aligned interests and capable of working together, the three Sanzar associations are a powerful unit. They cannot be dismissed by the respective national bodies. A battle is looming and it's a battle the associations want to win.

How they do it could be fascinating. Could they threaten to withdraw the players from June tests in future years? Possibly.

No one wants it come to that but Piet Heymans of the South African Players Association says: "We might have to take drastic action."

In their eyes, the concept is being misrepresented as an opportunity to rekindle old-fashioned tours and has failed to address any of the issues that sparked the initial review of the existing set-up.

All three unions question whether the Northern Hemisphere will take adequate player resources on such trips to handle three back-to-back tests.

They doubt whether many midweek games will be played because touring nations would need to travel with extended squads. England are this year, but it's one year out from a World Cup. How keen will they be in a non-World Cup year?

"Our administrators have really dropped the ball on this one," New Zealand Rugby Players Association boss Rob Nichol says. "If you go back to the principles laid out in Woking, none have been addressed."

It was in Woking - on the outskirts of London - that every key stakeholder in the global game met after the World Cup to thrash out the issues blighting rugby.

The June and November test windows were deemed the highest priorities as they had lost their appeal to players, fans and broadcasters.

Various ideas were proposed, such as axing the June window altogether and having one longer window in October-November. A series involving the top 10 teams in the world was also floated.

Integral to any change was the need to restructure the division of gate revenue. The amateur model of the home side keeping the lot disadvantages the smaller Southern Hemisphere grounds.

While the All Blacks, Wallabies and Springboks have largely respected the November window by sending their best sides north, the Six Nations have tended to treat the June window as a chore. They have sent weakened teams, making it hard to sell tickets.

Revenue-sharing has been rejected and all the other Woking proposals have died. The three Sanzar players' associations feel they have been fobbed off with more of the same. They still see the June window as broken.

While they don't yet have a specific plan of action, they are determined to somehow find a way to build June into a more inspiring format.

The expansion to Super15 and the conference format has been well received in both Australia and South Africa.

"We now have 20 local derbies a season," says Australian Rugby Players Association general manager Omar Hassanein. "That really makes for a strong proposition."

The South Africans are, for the first time in the professional age, convinced they are aligned with the right partners. Their constant flirting with Europe has ended.

The Super rugby travel burden has been greatly reduced by Super15 and Argentina's inclusion in the new Four Nations is a welcome addition.

"We have even been talking about when and how we next expand Super rugby," says Heymans. A sixth team, to be based in the Eastern Cape is still on the agenda in the Republic.