Time for a SANZAR XV
With British & Irish Lions fever high in South Africa, rugby365 columnist Ebrahim Moerat takes a look at a possible SANZAR selection to rival the tourists.
For any British or Irish rugby player, being selected for the Lions is the ultimate achievement and having a similar composite outfit from the three southern hemisphere partners would do wonders for the game.
All Black scrumhalf Justin Marshall recently suggested that an Australasian team should come together and tour every four years – just like the Lions do. Wallabies coach Robbie Deans also agreed with the concept, but he felt that by bringing South Africa into the frame the SANZAR team could have more credibility, and rightly so.
A Lions tour is one of the most highly anticipated rugby events and by introducing a SANZAR team into the Lions’ schedule would boost the tour’s status even further and commercially, the match would also be a viable option.
Crowd attendance in New Zealand and Australia have been on a steady decline over the past few years which suggests that Super Rugby and even Tri-Nations rugby is not the exciting product that it used to be.
Super Rugby in particular, has become very stale and it appears that the only option for SANZAR officials is to constantly increase the number of teams in the tournament. The expanded Tri-Nations series has also lost it’s aura and the new format simply doesn’t work.
By reducing the number of games in the Tri-Nations or even reducing the frequency of the tournament SANZAR will be able to launch southern hemisphere’s version of the Lions.
The SANZAR-Lions game would draw enormous interest and the outcome would also not be as one-sided as people would imagine.
But there could be various ways in which the SANZAR team can be introduced.
The team could tour the northern hemisphere at the end of the Tri-Nations or it can simply feature during every Lions tour.
If the SANZAR team opts for a proper tour rather than one-off matches it could become a highly respected outfit and perhaps start a tradition similar to the Lions.
It is very rare for professional players form different countries to play alongside each other and the Lions and perhaps the Barbarians, are currently the only two teams that give players this opportunity.
But the arguing between the three SANZAR partners over the restructuring of Super Rugby, suggests that launching a southern hemisphere composite team may be a step too far.
My SANZAR XV: 15 Mills Muliaina (NZ), 14 Sitiveni Sivivatu (NZ), 13 Stirling Mortlock (Aus), 12 Ma’a Nonu (NZ), 11 Bryan Habana (SA), 10 Matt Giteau (Aus), 9 Fourie Du Preez (SA), 8 Pierre Spies (SA), 7 Richie McCaw (NZ), 6 George Smith (Aus), 5 Victor Matfield (SA), 4 Bakkies Botha (SA), 3 Clint Newland (NZ), 2 Aled de Malmanche (NZ), 1 Tendai Mtawarira (SA)
Replacements: 16 Stephen Moore (Aus), 17 Tony Woodcock (NZ), 18 Nathan Sharpe (Aus), 19 Phil Waugh (Aus), 20 Brendon Leonard (NZ), 21 Stephen Donald (NZ), 22 Jaque Fourie (SA)
By Ebrahim Moerat
Do you agree with Ebrahim’ views? Let us know…
