Three teams, one from Australia and two from South Africa, will be axed from Super Rugby as the mainly southern hemisphere competition reverts to 15 teams for next season, governing body SANZAAR said on Sunday.
The South African and Australian unions will make the decision over which of their teams will go, but the Perth-based Western Force, Bloemfontein-based Cheetahs and Kings are the three franchises most vulnerable to the axe.
"This restructuring by SANZAAR represents a crucial step in its strategic planning process that has included a comprehensive assessment of the economic and sporting environment," said a SANZAAR statement.
Is this the offload of the season?#STOvCHI pic.twitter.com/RaPXE8Qmfx
— Super Rugby (@SuperRugbyNZ) April 8, 2017
The restructuring comes after widespread criticism of the first season of the 18-team format, which was introduced in 2016 after Argentina's Jaguares and the Sunwolves of Japan joined the competition and the Port Elizabeth-based Kings returned.
SANZAAR, made up of the South African, New Zealand, Australian and Argentine unions, met in London last month to try to hammer out a solution to the problems of an over-complicated structure and a dilution in the quality of the product.
Negotiations with broadcasters, who agreed a four-year deal in 2016, and other stakeholders
New structure of the Super Rugby competition for next season after governing body SANZAAR announced the culling of three as yet to be determined teams on Sunday.
* 120 match regular season plus seven finals
* 15 teams
* Three conferences (New Zealand, Australia, South Africa)
* Japan's Sunwolves to play in Australia conference, Argentina's Jaguares in South Africa.
* 18 rounds (16 matches per team, two bye weeks)
* Each team will play eight matches within its conference (four home and four away)
* Each team will play eight cross-conference matches against four of the five teams from the other two conferences (four at home and four away)
* Each team will have played 12 of the other teams within the season (85 percent which is up from 70 percent under 2016-17 format).
* Eight team play-offs: Three conference winners and five wild card places the next best performing teams after the conference winners regardless of conference.
