NEW YORK, NY – This was the weekend of big announcements. Led by the earth-shattering news about Jarryd Hayne coming back to rugby. There were also a few big transactions that demanded to be reported and we also have some fixture results to report. So lets get to it and start the Global Recap:
News & Transactions:
Jarryd Hayne: In a dramatic week, Jarryd Hayne retired from the National Football League and San Fransisco 49ers. But rather than a return to Australia’s National Rugby League, Hayne has chose to try and make the Fiji 7s team for the Olympics. Those dreams were then derailed by reports he would not qualify because of drug test issues. After these stunning announcements, we now are being told that his dream is still alive; the drug-test mandate doesn’t apply. Read this, for more.
English Premiership: Bath announced that head coach Mike Ford will be leaving the club. Going from 2nd to 9th in one season, was a concern but the parting of ways has surprised more than few people… Wasps have confirmed that George Smith will be returning to Japan to join his old side Suntory Sungoliath at the end of the season. As we reported in our preview, recent Wasps signee Kurtley Beale went down injured in his Super Rugby match. It has now been confirmed that Beale hurt his knee and has already had surgery on it, with the expectation that he will need 6 months of recovery before he can return to action. Considering he signed a 1 year contract, it will be interesting to see how thing unfold.
Top14: Toulouse veteran Vincent Clerc has confirmed that he will leave the club at the end of the season after 14 years.
Pro 12: Bradley Davies will be leaving Wasps of the Premiership and returning to Welsh rugby having signed a National Dual Contract with the Welsh Rugby Union and the Ospreys… Edinburgh confirmed that Jason Tovey, who joined the club on loan in March until the end of the season, has now signed until May 2018.
Super Rugby: The Brumbies announced that they have signed Reds and Wallabies hooker Saia Fainga’a on a one-year deal for the 2017 Super Rugby season.
USA Rugby: USA Rugby announced that this upcoming weekend’s USA Rugby Emirates Airline Men’s and Women’s Club National Playoffs will be streamed live on www.USARugbyTV.com!
World Rugby: World Rugby chimed in on the Jarryd Hayne announcement from a rugby laws perspective, specifically in regards to Regulation 21 and to playing sevens. They stated “Hayne would be eligible for the London round of the HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series subject to all other regulatory and registration matters being met. He would also be immediately included in World Rugby’s pre-Rio 2016 risk-based testing programme, which since January 2016 has included a comprehensive programme of targeted in and out of competition blood and urine testing on players likely to compete in Rio. The pre-Games programme also includes regular additional screening for substances such as ESAs and human growth hormone, and both steroidal and hematological athlete biological profiling.”
The weekend’s fixtures:
PRO Rugby
: Professional rugby in America’s inaugural season continues. In the fifth round of play, Denver traveled to Sacramento and San Diego hosted Ohio. Our own Jake Frechette has a review of the Denver v Sacramento game and the Ohio v San Diego game, if you follow the links.
Paris 7s: The 2015/2016 HSBC World Rugby Mens Sevens Series completed its penultimate leg, this past weekend in Paris. For a complete review of the tournament and team USA‘s performance, just click here.
European Rugby Champions Cup: We have a winner!! The European (Rugby) Champions Cup final is over and a winner has been crowned. Once again, the RWU Wolf Man Ronan Nelson will have complete review of the final featuring the final RWU Analysts’ pick results in just a bit.
European Rugby Challenge Cup: The second tier, European Challenge Cup tournament also crowned its champion. The Top 14’s Montpellier won a tough match against Harlequins of the Aviva Premiership. The Cup was the only avenue to Champions Cup rugby for Harlequins and the final game for their director of rugby Conor O’Shea. Unfortunately for them, Montpellier had no time for sentimentality as they led from start to finish despite a furious fight back from Quins towards the end of the match.
Here are the results:
Fri – 13 May 2016
Harlequins 19 – 26 Montpellier
Super Rugby: Super Rugby has gone from 6 teams in 1996 to 18 teams in 2016. It only covered 3 countries and 3 times zones then, now it has games in 6 countries, crosses more than 7 time zones and has four conferences. The 12th round of fixtures, started with the Crusaders falling to the Highlanders and the Brumbies securing first place in the Australia conference by defeating the Rebels. The remaining matches saw the Hurricanes cruise past the Reds, while the Waratahs dominated the Bulls, and the Sunwolves surprisingly drew with the Stormers. In a basement battle, the Cheetahs beat the Kings. The Lions-Blues match was one of the more anticipated matches of the round and it disappointed as the Lions steamrolled the Blues. The final match of the weekend saw the Jaguares fall short against the Sharks.
Here are the results:
Fri – 13 May 2016
Highlanders 34–26 Crusaders
Rebels 22-30 Brumbies
Sat – 14 May 2016
Hurricanes 29-14 Reds
Waratahs 31-8 Bulls
Sunwolves 17-17 Stormers
Cheetahs 34-20 Kings
Lions 43-5 Blues
Jaguares 22-25 Sharks
European Nations Cup: The ENC, or the 6 Nations “B” , is the premier tournament for the second-tier nations of Europe. Unbeknownst to some, the ENC consists of seven divisions, each featuring between four and six teams. The matches played will determine who will get promoted and relegated from groups 1B, 2A – 2D, and 3A over a two-year cycle. Division 1A, where the best teams in Europe not called England, Ireland, France, Italy, Wales or Scotland reside, has no promotion option – only relegation back to 1B. Hopefully promotion from 1A to the proper 6N will eventually occur… but we aren’t banking on it. This past weekend in 1B, the Netherlands edged out Sweden, while in 2B Hungary fell to Andorra and finally in 2C, tiny Luxembourg were too much for Slovenia.
Here are the results:
Sat – 14 May 2016
1B: Sweden 23-25 Netherlands
2B: Hungary 10-28 Andorra
2C: Luxembourg 29-10 Slovenia
The Asian Rugby Championship: which is similar to the ENC (European Nation’s Cup) but with 5 divisions with the 3 most dominant teams, the tri-nations of Korea, Hong Kong, and Japan in the top division. There are 4 teams in division 1 and 2 then division 3 is broken up into East, Central and West with 3 teams each before we finally get to division 4 with 7. Believe it or not this is allegedly streamlined from previous years where it was just 5 divisions and 5 teams in each. This weekend in Division 1 there is a 1 week tournament in Kuala Lumpur to find out the best team between the Philippines, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, and Singapore, who are replacing the withdrawn Kazakhstan. As for the action, Korea fell at the death to Hong Kong in the Top 3. In Division 1, Sri Lanka fought past the Philippines and Malaysia went undefeated as they took down Singapore.
Here are the results:
Sat – 14 May 2016
Top 3: Korea 27-34 Hong Kong
Division 1: Sri Lanka 25-21 Philippines
Division 1: Malaysia 40-13 Singapore
2015 Currie Cup qualification: The tournament is a competition between which will be played between 9 April and 23 July 2016. It will feature all fourteen South African provincial unions plus the Welwitschias from Namibia and will also serve as a qualifying competition for the 2016 Currie Cup, the 78th edition of South Africa’s premier domestic rugby union competition. Nine teams from this competition will play in the 2016 Currie Cup Premier Division, while the remaining six teams will play in the 2016 Currie Cup First Division. Round six’s fixtures began with the Blue Bulls falling to the Pumas, Border lost to Leopards and SouthWest District fell just short against Falcons. On Saturday Free State defeated Sharks, Boland crushed Griffons, the Welsitschias lost big to Griquas and finally in the battle of the provinces, Western demolished Eastern.
Here are the results:
Fri – 13 May 2016
Blue Bulls 13–25 Pumas
Border Bulldogs 22–34 Leopards
SWD Eagles 30–32 Falcons
Sat – 14 May 2016
Free State XV 19–13 Sharks XV
Boland Cavaliers 56–17 Griffons
Welwitschias 25–55 Griquas
Western Province 50–10 Eastern Province Kings
That is it for now. Feel free to comment below, look for and “Like” our Facebook Rugby Wrap Up Page and follow us on Twitter@: RugbyWrapUp, Junoir Blaber, James Harrington, Jamie Wall, Nick Hall, DJ Eberle, Jake Frechette, Scheenagh Harrington, Ronan Nelson and Declan Yeats.
And as always, stay low and keep pumping those legs.
