Michael Burgess: Fair schedule for Los Pumas por favor

Argentina have the Rugby Championship's toughest schedule. Photo / Getty Images

It's time to give Argentina a fair crack in the Rugby Championship.

When they joined the competition in 2012, they were expected to be the poor cousins but it hasn't helped that Los Pumas have been treated as such.

The schedule, which has been fixed for the past three seasons, does them no favours. The South Americans have the least depth of any of the four nations and tend to peak for the first few rounds.

By the time they get to their final two matches on home soil, which should be the climax in front of their passionate fans, they have little left in the tank.

It has been reflected by the results, with most of those final-leg matches disappointingly one-sided. And when the inevitable injuries strike, that further weakens them for their home matches.

You could say it's the same for all teams but it's clearly not. Across the first four games, the All Blacks and Australia have to contend with just one return trip across the Tasman each. Coming into round five, Argentina have already crossed both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans twice.

The schedule needs to change. Granted, there are commercial and logistical imperatives but what is the ultimate goal? Surely it has to be the fairest and most competitive Rugby Championship possible.

The current format is locked in until the 2016 season, when there needs to be a rethink.

Why not just reverse the current draw? Kick off with New Zealand in Africa and the Wallabies visiting Argentina. Then the All Blacks can travel to South America (and Australia to South Africa) before the concluding legs in Australasia.

Argentina have earned the chance to get some early momentum. Before they joined the Sanzar elite, there were fears they would be cannon fodder, but they have acquitted themselves well, earning a draw in 2012 as well as seven bonus points from losses of seven points or less.

Drilling deeper, their tendency to perform well in the first phase of the competition becomes obvious. If you leave aside the 73-13 aberration in Johannesburg in 2013, the Pumas have lost by an average margin of nine points in the first month of the tournament over the past three seasons.

Their final phase matches at home during that period have yielded average losing margins of 25 points.

"We need to create certainty in the market," said Sanzar chief executive Greg Peters, to explain why the format has not changed in the past three seasons. "For example, the Bledisloe Cup week in New Zealand has been locked in every year, as has the Australian fixture the following week.

"It means people and organisations can plan well ahead and Tourism NSW ran some extremely successful campaigns ahead of the match in Sydney. South Africa has had certainty around dates of fixtures as well."

Peters confirmed their won't be a full series of games next year due to the Rugby World Cup and there is a new schedule to be agreed for 2016.

"There may be a rotation of matches," he said. "We have some unique challenges due to geography but we will look at all the options."