Super Rugby Pacific: Is it too simple to make the playoffs?

The Crusaders celebrate their lone victory over the Chiefs. Photo / Photosport

The playoffs picture in Super Rugby Pacific has cleared a little after last weekend, but has again raised questions of whether the playoff system is too liberal.

The top eight of 12 teams contest the Super Rugby quarter-finals and, after nine rounds this season, the price of admission to the top eight is only three wins or 13 points.

Last year the Reds squeaked into the top eight with five wins and 24 points from the full 15 rounds of the regular season. In 2022, the Highlanders qualified with four wins and 23 points, four wins and 12 points behind the seventh-placed Reds.

With six rounds left in the current season, Moana Pasifika are on the fringe of the playoffs in eighth place with three wins and 12 points, one win and one point ahead of the Waratahs.

All 12 teams technically are still in with a chance of making the playoffs, even the defending champions, the Crusaders, who have won only one of eight matches. The Crusaders suffered one of their worst defeats this season on Saturday when they went down 37-15 to the Western Force.

On the current reckoning, the top three teams - the Hurricanes, Blues and Brumbies - are already safe in the playoffs. The fourth-placed Melbourne Rebels and fifth-placed Chiefs are on the margins.

The financially-troubled Rebels appear to have overperformed by winning five of their eight matches. But those wins have come over lower-ranked Australian teams, Moana Pasifika and the Fijian Drua. They have a tough run towards the playoffs with three matches against New Zealand teams, another against the Brumbies and a last-round match against the Drua in Fiji.

The Chiefs have five wins and 23 points and are likely to make the playoffs, though they have to face the Hurricanes and Blues in their last two regular-season matches.

Asafo Aumua had another impressive outing against the Chiefs. Photo / Photosport

The run-in will be critical in the last weeks of the season. Moana Pasifika have a tough finish with matches against the Drua in Fiji, then four Kiwi sides in their last five weeks.

The Waratahs have an even tougher run in with matches still to come against the Chiefs, the Hurricanes, the Blues, the Brumbies and the Reds.

In each case, the run-in will help determine final placings and quarter-final match-ups. The question remains whether the first round of playoffs can provide compelling competition when the top teams will be drawn against sides which at best have won half as many matches.

Super Rugby Pacific has struggled to attract crowds in Australia and New Zealand this season - not in Fiji though, where 15,400 filled the national stadium to watch the Drua play the Hurricanes on Friday.

A system in which twice as many teams make the playoffs as miss out may not help attract fans, though it prolongs some teams’ involvement.

In the A-League, six out of 12 teams make the playoffs. The NRL has eight playoff qualifiers out of 17 teams and uses a weighted system which advantages the highest-placed teams.

Super Rugby’s too generous system may need reappraisal, given than no team has won the tournament from further back than fourth place after the regular season.