NEW YORK, NY – Hopefully, this finds our friends that celebrated America’s Birthday with whatever body parts they had prior still in tact. Digits be damned, we still have a Global Rugby Recap to get to re: Women’s Super Series, Olympic 7s, Sudamerica Board, Venter, Henry, Messam, De Luca, de Jager and more… so let’s do it.
News & Transactions:
As always, Ladies first:
USA Rugby: USA Rugby AIG Women’s Collegiate All-Americans Head Coach Sue Whitwell has selected 26 athletes from the recent Junior and Collegiate Stars and Stripes Camp for a two-match series with Rugby Canada’s Maple Leafs this week. For the full roster, click here.
Aviva Premiership: London Irish announced that Brendan Venter is returning to the club to take up a new role of technical director with immediate effect… Gloucester confirmed that Scottish international scrum-half Greig Laidlaw has been named as club captain for the forthcoming season. The Cherry and Whites also confirmed that Australian center Bill Meakes has been released from his contract with the club so that he would be free to return to Australia and play Super Rugby… Wasps announced the signing of Scottish international center Nick De Luca, who will arrive from Biarritz ahead of the 2016/17 season.
Pro 12: Leinster have confirmed that former Wales and All Blacks head coach Sir Graham Henry will join the province on a short-term deal in July to assist the current coaching staff. Leinster head coach Leo Cullen has confirmed that former wing Niall Morris has re-joined the province on a short-term deal from Leicester of the Aviva Premiership in England.
Super Rugby: All Blacks flanker Liam Messam is grateful to the Chiefs and his Japanese club, Toshiba Brave Lupus, for giving him a lifeline to return to Super Rugby. Messam has put the disappointment of missing out on selection for New Zealand‘s squad for next month’s Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro behind him and is ready to be a replacement player for the Hamilton-based Chiefs in Super Rugby in 2016. Toshiba Brave Lupus, who have signed Messam for the next two years, have given the 43-Test veteran permission to play for the Chiefs in the last two rounds of the regular season as well as the play-off matches… Cheetahs lock Lood de Jager will have to decide whether he will make the Lions or the Bulls home next season.
World Rugby: World Rugby has announced a strong line-up of speakers to participate in the Breaking new markets – delivering and sustaining a truly global and inclusive game panel at the World Rugby Conference and Exhibition 2016 (ConfEx) on 14-15 November at the Hilton London Metropole. Global Head of Sponsorship and Events at HSBC, Giles Morgan, newly elected World Rugby Vice-Chairman and former Argentina captain, Agustín Pichot and the NFL’s Executive Vice-President of International, Mark Waller, will lead the discussion on rugby’s position as a rapidly-growing global sport, while investigating the opportunities and challenges for the game over the next decade. Further speakers will be announced soon… A new Sudamérica Rugby Board has been selected at the regional association’s Annual General Assembly in Buenos Aires, Argentina, with Marcelo Rodríguez succeeding Carlos Barbieri as Chairman.
The new Sudamérica Rugby Board is:
Chairman: Marcelo Rodríguez (Argentina)
First Vice-President: Antonio Vizintín (Uruguay)
Second Vice-President: Salvador Encinas (Chile)
Secretary: Víctor Luaces (Argentina)
Treasurer: Ariel Mamanna (Argentina)
Members: Xavier Vouga (Brazil), Oscar Moreira Lacasa (Paraguay), Antonio Quintero (Venezuela); Tomás Petersen (Argentina), Andrés Pieroni (Uruguay), Sebastián Bianchi (Chile) and Nathaly Montonya Ruales (Peru)
The weekend’s fixtures:
Again, Ladies first:
Super Series: The USA Rugby Womens’ Super Series is a four team tournament featuring the USA, France, Women’s Rugby World Cup 2014 Finalists Canada and WRWC 2014 Champions England. Hosted in conjunction with First15 Sport Performance and with the help of Rugby Utah and the Utah Sports Commission, the Super Series will be played at the Regional Athletic Complex, with the teams training at the University of Utah campus, both locations are in Salt Lake City. The WRWC Final rematch saw Canada steal the show with with a seven-try defeat of England. The Eagles’ clash with France saw them come up short against the Six Nations champions.
Here are the results:
Fri – 1 Jul 2016
Canada 52-17 England
USA 13-19 France
Here is the schedule:
Tue – 5 Jul 2016
France – England
USA – Canada
PRO Rugby: Round 12 of the inaugural season has just wrapped up. In this round, Sacramento blew by San Francisco and claimed fourth place in the standings. Meanwhile, it was San Diego‘s turn to travel to midwest and become the latest side to fall against Ohio at Fortress Obetz. We will have a review of the matches coming out shortly.
Here are the results:
Sun – 3 Jul 2016
Sacramento 43-19 San Francisco
San Diego 21-44 Ohio
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. After a break for the international window, the season re-starts. The latest round of fixtures, started with the Chiefs moving atop the Super Rugby standings on after defeating the Crusaders in Suva, Fiji in a New Zealand derby. In an Australian derby, The Brumbies secured a deserved victory over the Reds. As for the weekend’s remaining matches, the Sunwolves lost big to the Waratahs, the Hurricanes took down the Blues in another Kiwi derby and the Rebels fell to the Stormers. Then we had the Cheetahs winning by the narrowest margin possible against the Force, with the Lions dominating the Sharks in a South African derby. Finally, the Kings got thumped by the Highlanders and the Jaguares defeated the Bulls in South America.
Here are the results:
Fri – 1 Jul 2016
Crusaders 13-23 Chiefs
Brumbies 43-24 Reds
Sat – 2 Jul 2016
Sunwolves 12-57 Waratahs
Hurricanes 37-27 Blues
Rebels 31-57 Stormers
Cheetahs 30-29 Force
Lions 37-10 Sharks
Kings 18-48 Highlanders
Jaguares 29-11 Bulls
Rugby Americas North: Another regional tournament in full swing is the Rugby Americas North (formerly the North America and Caribbean Rugby Association or NACRA) Championship. The RAN Championship is for the countries in North America and the Caribbean. RAN has 2 zones with top level (championship) and a bottom level (cup). Each Championship zone has 3 teams while the Cup Zones have 4 each. The Zones are regionally divided, so there is a North Zone and South Zone. USA Rugby competes in the North Zone Championship division. The USA is represented by the USA South Regional all-star team, in order to develop talent and make the competition a much fairer one. All of this year’s matches will double as World Cup Qualifiers. This weekend in the North, Mexico defeated the Cayman Islands, ending the Caymans‘ RWC dream.
Here are the results:
Sat – 2 Jul 16
North: Mexico 34-24 Cayman Islands
Africa Cup: The Africa Cup 2016 will be the sixteenth edition of the continental tournament that involves the best African national teams, organized by the Rugby Afrique, formerly known as the Confederation of African Rugby (CAR). Given their superiority, the South African national team has rarely participated in most tournaments. The four times the SARU has participated, they sent either a U-23 team or amateur side, and went on to win it. Beyond South Africa, there are up to 27 rugby countries in the Cup with the national participants in the two divisions with each division divided into three groups (1A, 1B, 1C, 2 West, 2 East, and 2 South), with promotion and relegation. In the 1B division, the teams are divided into pools and in pool B action in Tunisia this week, there has been a 1B tri-nations battle for the pool B winner. Tunisia crushed the Ivory Coast to top the pool and will now face Senegal for the 1B title in November. In 1A action this weekend, Uganda fell at home against Namibia.
Here are the results:
Sat – 2 Jul 2016
Uganda 31-40 Namibia
Tunisia 50-5 Ivory Coast
2016 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 thirteen’s fixtures begin with the Sharks falling to the Leopards, then we had the Blue Bulls coming up short against Boland. Also on the fixture list, Free State topped the Falcons, the Golden Lions crushed the Griffons, Eastern Province lost to Griquas, the Welwitschiaswere smashed by Border and finally SouthWest District soundly beaten by Western Province.
Here are the results:
Fri – 1 Jul 2016
Sharks XV 26-23 Leopards
Blue Bulls 26-35 Boland Cavaliers
Sat – 2 Jul 16
Free State XV 33-27 Falcons
Golden Lions XV 66-19 Griffons
Eastern Province Kings 12-29 Griquas
Welwitschias 18-76 Border Bulldogs
Western Province 45-17 SWD Eagles
That’s all for now, please feel free to comment below, look for and “Like” our Facebook Rugby Wrap Up Page and follow us on Twitter@: RugbyWrapUp, Junoir Blaber, @MeetTheMatts, Luke Bienstock, Ronan Nelson, James Harrington and Declan Yeats.
