is the Rainbow Cup still going ahead?

[mildlyinterested]

im shocked.

[LeinsterLeader]

im shocked.

So we're havin a South African Competition, without the South Africans?

Will Munster be their only representative?

[Avenger]

im shocked.

So we're havin a South African Competition, without the South Africans?

Will Munster be their only representative?

[ronk]

South African teams will not be travelling to Europe according to reports - more details will apparently follow

Are we playing them on Zoom?

[blockhead]

Rúaidhrí O'Connor@RuaidhriOC
There'll still be six rounds of a Pro14 Cup and a final, even when the South Africans pull out...

But then it aint a rainbow Ruaidhri

[LeinsterLeader]

Rúaidhrí O'Connor@RuaidhriOC
There'll still be six rounds of a Pro14 Cup and a final, even when the South Africans pull out...

But then it aint a rainbow Ruaidhri

We could try and get the LGBTQ+ people involved.

The Marketing writes itself

[alanair]

Rúaidhrí O'Connor@RuaidhriOC
There'll still be six rounds of a Pro14 Cup and a final, even when the South Africans


Why ........

[Xanthippe]

If they had decided this early enough they could have run it as a knock out cup competition. All teams in a hat (plus 4 byes instead of the SA teams) and do a straight draw - first team out gets home advantage. At least the knock-out element would have added a bit of excitement - something a little bit different.

[Dexter]

If they had decided this early enough they could have run it as a knock out cup competition. All teams in a hat (plus 4 byes instead of the SA teams) and do a straight draw - first team out gets home advantage. At least the knock-out element would have added a bit of excitement - something a little bit different.

Yeah, or even like the junior world cup, small groups followed by playoffs for positions. Then at least everyone gets the same amount of games. Something slightly different.

[heno]

The main thing is we are playing the Irish teams first so have strong opposition for the European Cup warm up games. What happens after that is essentially a warm up for the lions tour, so if that is cancelled or what ever it won't bother me much.

Sent from my SM-A520F using Tapatalk

[mildlyinterested]

With no formal approvals in place to allow the South African teams to enter the UK and Ireland for their Guinness PRO14 Rainbow Cup fixtures, PRO14 Rugby and SA Rugby will operate dual tournaments with no cross-hemisphere fixtures.

Despite a colossal effort, the South African teams were not granted the permission to travel in time to allow the Guinness PRO14 Rainbow Cup to be played as originally planned. Such challenges are not unique to rugby as many international sports have found the Covid-19 pandemic a difficult landscape to plan for.

All options for the South African teams to travel to Europe safely were explored and exhausted by the league, this is due to the heightened restrictions caused by South Africa’s presence on the red list of the territories involved.

The ‘northern’ Guinness PRO14 Rainbow Cup will still take place on the dates previously published. The fixtures for Rounds 4, 5 and 6 had already been scheduled and provided to clubs, but will now have the South African teams removed and kick-off times may be modified ahead of publishing.

The ‘southern’ tournament will be called Rainbow Cup SA and will include the Cell C Sharks, DHL Stormers, Emirates Lions and Vodacom Bulls with full details to be confirmed shortly. These games will be available in the UK and Ireland with PRO14 Rugby’s current TV partners.

A wide stakeholder group, led by a working group between the tournament team at PRO14 Rugby and SA Rugby, produced a long list of various options for entry of the teams, base camps and high-standard medical protocols across the past four months to cater for different scenarios.

In total, 12 venues across the UK, Ireland and Europe were considered as base camps for the South African teams to operate out of or to use as a quarantine destination before entering the UK and Ireland. SA Rugby also explored another four locations separate to this. Further, destinations in the Middle East were also explored as potential hosts for fixtures involving South African teams.

This process produced project plans for each venue to include suitable training and accommodation facilities and charter travel schedules under the constant guidance of a Medical Management Committee, consisting of the PRO14 medical consultant, tournament staff and union Chief Medical Officers. This group tracked the status of Covid-19 in the various territories and advised on the strategic approach to governments at all times.

Throughout this process, PRO14 Rugby has had great support of governments and health authorities in all jurisdictions.

This decision will have no impact on the long-term partnership between PRO14 Rugby and SA Rugby and more details about those plans and league structure for the ground-breaking 2021/22 season onwards will be made public shortly.

https://www.leinsterrugby.ie/pro14-rain ... -approach/

[riocard911]

It would seem trying to initiate a transcontinental professional team sport competition in the middle of a global pandemic is extremely difficult. Who knew? Certainly not all the begrudgery know-alls on FB and Twitter. At least the Pro14 unions and SARU are trying. Credit, where credit is due. And if a curtailed Pro14 season leads to a fifth star on the Leinster jersey, you won't hear me complaining.....

[blockhead]

It would seem trying to initiate a transcontinental professional team sport competition in the middle of a global pandemic is extremely difficult. Who knew? Certainly not all the begrudgery know-alls on FB and Twitter. At least the Pro14 unions and SARU are trying. Credit, where credit is due. And if a curtailed Pro14 season leads to a fifth star on the Leinster jersey, you won't hear me complaining.....

Yeah. And GT in the IT has a big smug told you so article out today. Gobshite!

[wixfjord]

It would seem trying to initiate a transcontinental professional team sport competition in the middle of a global pandemic is extremely difficult. Who knew? Certainly not all the begrudgery know-alls on FB and Twitter. At least the Pro14 unions and SARU are trying. Credit, where credit is due. And if a curtailed Pro14 season leads to a fifth star on the Leinster jersey, you won't hear me complaining.....

Like you've hit the nail on the head there by saying trying to initiate a transcontinental professional team sport competition in the middle of a global pandemic is extremely difficult.

Anyone a brain could see this was going to happen miles out, yet they chose to chop up the season and just plow ahead with a half baked competition.

So why should the unions get credit for this epic lack of foresight?

It's grand for us that we're in Europe, but almost every other league team is now left with glorified friendlies to play out the rest of the season.

[wixfjord]

It would seem trying to initiate a transcontinental professional team sport competition in the middle of a global pandemic is extremely difficult. Who knew? Certainly not all the begrudgery know-alls on FB and Twitter. At least the Pro14 unions and SARU are trying. Credit, where credit is due. And if a curtailed Pro14 season leads to a fifth star on the Leinster jersey, you won't hear me complaining.....

Yeah. And GT in the IT has a big smug told you so article out today. Gobshite!

He's absolutely correct in what he says.

They've double down based on ignoring reality and now are left with a dog's dinner of a competition that nobody really wants, while shortchanging everyone involved in the Pro14.

This was all utterly predictable months ago.

[ronk]

It's a 6 game competition of mostly derbies. This is a bigger opportunity for the non Irish teams if they go gung go for this.

And it's a Lion's year so the motivation is there for players, even ones who miss the tour still can make a name while on standby.

The Pro14 was a procession this year. But Leinster and Ulster, the 2 best teams are focused on Europe and Munster might be half arsed.

They made a big effort to make this happen. The Rainbow Cup was announced in December. So before the events that scuppered it (vaccine delays, variants, large outbreaks) and at a time where it was feasible. It made sense to try to replace the involvement of the 2 SA teams from the Pro14.

The treble is still on.

[mildlyinterested]

Important note on Rainbow Cup news: we understand that SA Rugby have still paid their participation fee, which is worth around 500k to each club. A good reason to have exhausted all avenues before accepting the inevitable

https://twitter.com/MarkPalmerST/status ... 65314?s=20

[blockhead]

It would seem trying to initiate a transcontinental professional team sport competition in the middle of a global pandemic is extremely difficult. Who knew? Certainly not all the begrudgery know-alls on FB and Twitter. At least the Pro14 unions and SARU are trying. Credit, where credit is due. And if a curtailed Pro14 season leads to a fifth star on the Leinster jersey, you won't hear me complaining.....

Yeah. And GT in the IT has a big smug told you so article out today. Gobshite!

He's absolutely correct in what he says.

They've double down based on ignoring reality and now are left with a dog's dinner of a competition that nobody really wants, while shortchanging everyone involved in the Pro14.

This was all utterly predictable months ago.

Wise after the event? Nothing is predictable atm. You can sit on the sidelines and jeer on the ones who have to make the actual calls.

[wixfjord]

Wise after the event? Nothing is predictable atm. You can sit on the sidelines and jeer on the ones who have to make the actual calls.

No predictable for literally months before the event. That's the point. That's what GT says in the article.

You can also critically assess the ones making the calls and how they got this risk so blindingly wrong by going against all logic right?

[LeRouxIsPHat]

It's a 6 game competition of mostly derbies. This is a bigger opportunity for the non Irish teams if they go gung go for this.

And it's a Lion's year so the motivation is there for players, even ones who miss the tour still can make a name while on standby.

The Pro14 was a procession this year. But Leinster and Ulster, the 2 best teams are focused on Europe and Munster might be half arsed.

They made a big effort to make this happen. The Rainbow Cup was announced in December. So before the events that scuppered it (vaccine delays, variants, large outbreaks) and at a time where it was feasible. It made sense to try to replace the involvement of the 2 SA teams from the Pro14.

The treble is still on.

The “announced in December” part of this makes it sound line they couldn’t have known what was about to happen. Of course they could have, we were in the middle of it all. I would wager that nearly all Irish people knew that we were headed for a severe lockdown after Christmas and yet these clowns carried on regardless and destroyed the league season as a result.

Sorry to go all GT about it (although I haven’t read the article) but read my posts in this thread and you’ll see how obvious it was. It’s not like I said anything particularly insightful, it was as clear as day.

The money mentioned is a load of nonsense as well. How much money could have been made if the season had gone on normally or been delayed by a month or two and some fans had been allowed into grounds? By the sounds of things in the UK there might even have been big crowds allowed. Instead we’re committed to a shitty cup tournament for no good reason.

I honestly believe that anyone involved in this (aside from whoever made sure that SA would at least pay the participation fee) is too incompetent to be in their job.

I’ve been on projects where the landscape changes and you change with it, you don’t just put your hand in the stand and pretend everything is fine until you’ve f%~ked everything up.