World Cup runneth over

Next year's rugby calendar will take on a drastic new look with proposals on the table to start the Super 14 as early as January and for the Tri Nations to revert back to its orginal home-and-away format.

The radical proposals are being considered because the World Cup starts in early September, leaving the New Zealand Rugby Union (NZRU) and their Sanzar partners a smaller window in which to fulfil obligations.

This year, the extended Super 14 programme kicked off in the second week of February and the extended Tri Nations will start on July 8 and run through until September 9.

With the opening game of the World Cup kicking off on September 7 in Paris, and competing teams traditionally reluctant to play tests a month out from the tournament, next year Sanzar effectively only has eight months to squeeze in Super 14, Tri Nations and respective inbound tours to the three countries.

New Zealand are scheduled to play two tests against France and one against Italy next year in the June window.

There are 31 weekends between January 1 and August 7, 2007. It takes 16 weekends to play Super 14, nine to play the Tri Nations and three to fulfil the inbound programme, meaning if Super 14 kicked off on January 5 next year, there would only be three weekends where elite players would not be pressed into action.

The All Blacks would have to play nine tests before the World Cup cut-off, then shift into training camp. To win the World Cup they will be required to play seven tests in six weeks, meaning they will have played 16 tests in five months.

Such a schedule would have to be considered too onerous and seriously detrimental to their chances of regaining a trophy that has escaped their clutches for 20 years.

The potential remedies to relieve the logjam include starting the Super 14 earlier and then shuffling everything back so the inbound tour games begin in May.

The Tri Nations seems almost certain to revert back to a home-and-away basis rather than each team playing each other three times.

NZRU chief exec Chris Moller said: "These things are being worked through. There are proposals on the table around a variety of things. I'm not saying we will not play a full round [Tri Nations] and nor am I saying we will. The practicality is that it depends on when we are going to play Super 14 and then we have the inbound tours - how many of those will there be? It may not be a question of moving Super 14, it may be a question of playing games much earlier after Super 14."

One other option to reduce the congestion would be to scrap the inbound programme altogether but that is likely to be rejected. Australia say they will definitely honour their commitments against Wales (twice) and Fiji, meaning that any restructuring would have to leave the Wallabies free to play those games.

New Zealand would also be reluctant to pass up the chance to play France - a side that remains one of the favourites to win the World Cup next year.

Reducing the Tri Nations to its original format will only be possible if the competition's broadcast rights owner, Newscorp, agrees.

Newscorp bought the five-year rights in 2004 under the premise that the Tri Nations would be a nine-game format.

- HERALD ON SUNDAY