Super Rugby was initially a brilliant competition, they had the right formula, and then messed with it when it became a you know what measuring contest within SANZAR.
The initial 5, 4, 3 structure between NZ, SA and AUS was about right in terms of markets, player base and interest.
It's actually hilarious how much it's been mismanaged since around 2005. SA wanted more teams and went through the whole court process of the Cheetahs and Southern Kings. Both ended up in URC after failing in Super Rugby and both are now dead as franchise teams at the elite level. Same in Aus, first the Force, then the Rebels. The Force they kicked out then let back in and the Rebels died after losing an astonishing $23m AUD. Invite in Japan, now gone. Invite in Argentina, gone too. Create a new NZ franchise which was never realistic.
What's left is a competition where the original franchises make up the current top 8, and the original SA teams, once they went to franchises, are the ones left in the URC. Surely that's a pretty stark realisation they messed up a good thing with all the duff, non-viable expansions.
Feels like they have two options. Either beg the South Africans to come back and run a 22 home and away game Super 12 season, or collapse the entire thing and go back to a pre-Super 12 style comp where you have, for arguments sake, the top 8 finishers in the previous season's NPC, a Fijian rep side, a Tongan rep side, a Samoan rep side, a Japanese rep side, and the 4 Australian teams in a 4x4 group stage tournament with quarter finals, semis and a final. A bit like the European Rugby Cup or Champions League in football. It could run concurrently with the NPC.
I can't see the current tournament continuing in its current form with 10 teams.
