By DYLAN CLEAVER
Under one of the proposed scenarios for a global season, the NPC and Super 12 would be split into two blocks during World Cup year.
Consultancy firm Deloitte & Touche has completed a report on how a global season could be implemented and the Herald on Sunday understands one proposal has the Super 12 and NPC played in two separate blocks.
Every four years, the Super 12 would start in February and adjourn in March, before starting again in August and finishing in the last week of September. Likewise the NPC would start in April, running until June - when the World Cup would kick off - before re-starting after the final of the Super 12 in September.
Under this scenario there would be no northern hemisphere tours to the southern hemisphere in a World Cup year.
Another radical scenario suggests a single international window in August and September which would see southern hemisphere nations hosting tours before embarking on their own northern tour straight afterwards.
The other three scenarios would have two windows which would sandwich the mid-year Tri Nations.
The New Zealand Rugby Union has cast its eye over all the Deloitte scenarios for a global season, with the above proposal seemingly the most radical.
Under the other three proposals put forward by Deloitte, southern hemisphere rugby's four major competitions - the Tri Nations, Super 12, NPC and South Africa's Currie Cup - would remain untouched, or move backwards or forwards by a couple of weeks.
In nearly all cases it is the northern hemisphere that will be forced to adjust their major competitions - the Six Nations, European competitions the Heineken Cup and Parker Pen Shield, and domestic club competitions. Most scenarios push the Six Nations to an end-of-season tournament.
The move towards a global rugby season is expected to be the burning topic at the IRB full board meeting next month in Ireland and is designed to allow international players an extended period of no rugby.
Any proposal is expected to meet with opposition from northern hemisphere clubs as every scenario from Deloitte's will require heavy restructuring.
The global season aims to streamline existing competitions into a logical flow to minimise the disruption of international rugby on club and provincial competitions.
Management consultant Deloitte has issued four scenarios to national unions. It has adhered to a hierarchy of competitions which starts with the World Cup at the top; the Six Nations and Tri Nations next; international tours; the Super 12 and Heineken [European] Cup; southern hemisphere provincial competitions and northern hemisphere domestic leagues; and finally, northern hemisphere domestic cup competitions.
New Zealand Rugby Union boss Chris Moller said any dissent would be premature.
"Deloitte's have scenarios for some comment, but they have absolutely stressed that those scenarios are simply to gather information to undertake evaluation," Moller said. "They are not proposals.
"I know there are concerns in other countries that the information is being presented in this light."
But reports from the UK predict trouble ahead.
The powerful French clubs in particular, which have bankrolled many a Kiwi rugby player's retirement, would fiercely resist having their domestic championship shoehorned into an IRB-dictated period.
After discussions with various sources, the Herald on Sunday can reveal the four scenarios, though it is understood the Wales Rugby Union, under the leadership of former NZRU chief David Moffatt, is forwarding a further option. The unions have been asked to respond to all four scenarios.
"We've been quite vocal on the subject of advocating that a global season should be looked at. We don't whether there's an answer, or what the right answer is, but we support the work the IRB is undertaking," Moller said.
Moller said he was not expecting quick resolution.
"It will take, in my view, three, maybe even five years to align all the commercial arrangements around the world. It's not something that will happen in a relatively short space of time."
His counterpart at the Rugby Football Union is on record saying he would consider moves to shift the Six Nations, the most historic rugby tournament of them all.
"The possibility of moving the Six Nations is something that is well worth exploring," Francis Baron said. "We're prepared to look at all options. We have to be positive about change if there's a big prize to be gained in sorting out the pressure points of the season."
But opposition has already been voiced in Ireland and Scotland to any proposal to move the annual tournament to the end of the season.
- THE HERALD ON SUNDAY
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