Super Rugby: underperforming Aussies don’t do themselves any favours as axe sharpens

THE Aussie sides are sitting 10th, 11th, 13th, 14th and last after two weeks of Super Rugby action. It’s certainly not a great endorsement for keeping five teams.

Tensions boil over in the Force-Reds clash.

• Waratahs: no match for hungry Lions

• Rebels: horror start continues unabated

• Brumbies: heartbreak as Sharks win at death

IN a week that could decide whether they survive in Super Rugby or get the axe, the Force are leading the Australian conference.

The Rebels - the other team under threat - are stone motherless last in the entire competition, having shipped 127 points and 18 tries in their opening two matches. Even the Sunwolves are doing better.

Talk about timing.

SANZAAR’s heavy hitters will meet in London on Friday morning (after World Rugby meetings) to thrash out once and for all what Super Rugby will look like next year.

Or at least that’s the plan.

Tensions boil over in the Force-Reds clash.

Following a strategic review and report by Accenture, the revised structure of Super Rugby was supposed to be agreed upon around Christmas but the decision was pushed back to the next SANZAAR board meeting in March.

There were suspicions why, and they appear to have been confirmed.

By waiting until two rounds of Super Rugby had even played, a briefly mapped - and potentially even unfair - lay of the land in Southern Hemisphere rugby has been allowed to emerge.

The strong are pretty much the same as last year - New Zealand teams, the Lions, Stormers etc.

The weak are .. well, the weak look uncomfortably Australian.

The Force, who won their first game at home in 663 days over the Reds last week, are the highest placed Aussie team on the normal ladder in 10th.

Next comes the Reds (11th) and Waratahs (13th) with win and a loss each. The winless Brumbies are 14th.

It’s a two-week sample size that really shouldn’t matter in London but it will because it adds strength to the argument that Australia don’t have the cattle for five teams.

It is a fortnight that captures the last five years.

It’s been a major struggle early for the Rebels.

New Zealand think it. South Africa think it. And, as it stands, about half of the Australian board think it.

One of the options the ARU will take to London is giving up a team.

That has been strongly opposed in many quarters of Australian rugby, most notably by the players. They want to keep five teams.

Had Australian teams come out and won 80 per cent of their games in the opening two rounds, that argument would have stood on solid ground.

But the first two rounds have yielded three Australian wins from 10 games, with 23 tries for and 41 tries against.

They are not compelling facts to roll up and thumping the SANZAAR board table with.

As mentioned, two rounds is a small sample. The Brumbies are winless but have played two good sides. The jury is probably still out on the Waratahs, Reds and Force but if they’ve had enough chance to flex some competition-wide muscle and haven’t.

The Rebels, meanwhile, have timed their worst-ever start to a season at the worst possible time in the worst possible season.

They were hammered by the Blues and the Hurricanes in successive weeks, and the bye this week will be no solace for under pressure coach Tony McGahan.

Melbourne have been hit hard by injury; they’re missing a handful of Wallabies and a half-dozen other players.

But that mitigation can easily be picked up and used against them, and the keep-five-Aussie-teams advocates. It proves there is no depth.

For all the data and the months and years of strategic discussions, don’t doubt that the last two weeks will be in the fresh in everyone’s mind in London this week.

Particularly for the ARU reps. It’s understood some board members see this as a politically safe way to return to four teams, consolidate talent and get Australia back into the winners’ circle in Super Rugby.

The financial savings are a big factor, too.

Other ARU powerbrokers are not as convinced and would prefer Australia walked away from Dublin with five teams.

Perhaps the biggest conundrum though, is which team would cop it if the ARU gets the axe out.

The Brumbies were talked about as a potential target but forget that: it can’t happen. One of the expansion franchises would go well before Australia’s most successful team.

The Force were everyone’s pick last year, broke on and off the field. But they’ve turned around this year on the field, have government sponsors and have a fertile rugby community in Perth.

The Rebels? They’re financially secure, privately owned and are able to fill a room for lunch with 1000 corporates in an AFL town.

But they are also sitting dead last, below the Sunwolves and with a minus-103 points differential.

And they probably haven’t hit rock bottom yet.

The Brumbies blew it late against the Sharks.

The Rebels were dusted by the Blues and the Blues then got dusted by the Chiefs. Guess who the Rebels play next?

Talk about timing.