2019-2020 World Sevens Series
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New Challenger Series to boost rugby sevens’ expansion
The World Rugby Sevens Challenger Series, a new and exciting international rugby sevens competition, will be launched in February 2020 to boost rugby sevens’ development across the globe. With sevens experiencing exponential growth from a performance and fan engagement perspective, World Rugby is launching men’s and women’s Sevens Challenger Series to develop the next generation of rugby players and take rugby sevens to new nations, further growing the popularity and participation of sevens following its hugely impactful Olympic debut at the Rio 2016 Games.The men’s series will feature 13 core teams from the six World Rugby regions who will compete over two rounds alongside three invitational teams. The top eight core teams after the two rounds will then compete in the final playoff tournament for a spot in the HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series, replacing the bottom placed core team in the World Series in the following season. This promotion and relegation system will provide a clear and consistent development pathway for teams ready to shine at the highest level of rugby sevens. The two legs of the inaugural World Rugby Sevens Challenger Series will be played in South America in Viña del Mar, Chile (15-16 February, 2020), and Montevideo, Uruguay (22-23 February, 2020).Thirteen nations have earned their place in the Challenger Series by finishing as the top ranked nations who are not already competing in the HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series at their respective regional sevens competitions in 2019. The teams who will compete in the 2020 World Rugby Sevens Challenger Series are Brazil, Chile, Germany, Hong Kong, Italy, Jamaica, Japan, Papua New Guinea, Portugal, Tonga, Uganda, Uruguay and Zimbabwe. They will be joined by three invitational teams from the Americas in Colombia, Mexico and Paraguay. The final play-off tournament will be hosted alongside the Cathay Pacific/HSBC Hong Kong Sevens event on 3-5 April, 2020.A separate announcement for the women’s Challenger Series will be made in due course. -
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@KiwiMurph Yes, and unlike Dubai and Cape Town, they'll play 5th place and 7th place play-off matches.
Teams can't afford to lose pool matches anymore. Only the four 1st placed men's teams and the three 1st placed and the best 2nd placed women's teams after the pool stage, will be able to win the tournament, so no second chances.
It's a bit odd that they change the format of the Sevens Series after two legs of the men's Series and three legs of the women's Series, and didn't make this change at the start of the Series.
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Err ... why?
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@booboo Good question and I've tried finding an explanation from World Rugby for the changes and I've not been able to find one.
They started reducing the number of games at the Glendale Sevens - the first leg of the women's Series in October - by no longer letting the bottom half of the participating nations play for the Challenge Trophy and by no longer playing the 7th and 11th place play-off games.
In both the men's and the women's tournament of Dubai and Cape Town, they didn't play the 5th and 7th place play-off games.
Now, they're changing it again for the Hamilton 7s.
According to the "standings page" on the WR website, men's teams finishing 7th and 8th should get the same number of competition points (10); also the teams finishing 11th and 12th should earn the same number of points (5), just like the nations finishing 15th and 16th (1 point each), but if you look at the actual standings, that's not what they have done. They've given 11 points to the 7th ranked team and 10 to the 8th ranked team; 6 points to the 11th ranked and 5 points to the 12th ranked team; and the points awarded to the lower ranked teams are also different.
They've also given points to the women's team differently from described.
Apparently, they awarded competition points to teams that didn't get to play the 5th and 7th place play-off games based on the ranking after the pool stage of the tournament, but it's still weird that they didn't do it as described.
Even if the new competition format is well-considered, their communication about it definitely is not.
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@Snowy said in 2019-2020 World Sevens Series:
@Bones said in 2019-2020 World Sevens Series:
Is the Hamilton 7s only two days?
Yep. Sat 26 and Sun 27th Jan.
Could that be why there's no quarter finals then?
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@Bones They skip the Quarter Finals, but play 5th and 7th place play-off games, which weren't played in Dubai and CT. The difference is only two games in both the men's and women's tournament; so 4 games overall.
Men's tournaments:
Dubai and Cape Town: 36 games (8 pool games on day 1; 16 pool games on day 2; 12 finals and play-off games on day 3); Hamilton 34 (16 pool games on day 1; 8 pool games and 10 finals and play-off games on day 2).Women's tournaments:
Dubai and Cape Town: 28 games (6 pool games on day 1; 12 pool games on day 2; 10 finals and play-off games on day 3); Hamilton: 26 (12 pool games on day 1; 6 pool games and 8 finals and play-off games on day 2).You have to wonder why they are not following the example of Dubai and Cape Town and start the tournament on Friday afternoon/evening with the first set of pool matches. Will they really get more people to the Tron by condensing the tournament and play all games on Saturday and Sunday? The Sunday is going to be a very, very long day (32 games instead of 20), while the Saturday stays the same.
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@KiwiMurph interesting read..
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Seems pretty shit to me. Sevens is flakey enough results wise, and now, effectively, if you lose a pool game you are likely out of the cup. I can see why sides yet to get Olympic qualification are pissed.
To sum it up:
"Unfortunately, all the decisions were made by a few individuals at World Rugby who ignored the advice and input of the players, coaches and high-performance managers in an attempt to take the series forward."
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I don't know why that article repeatedly says that the men's teams are losing the Cup QFs and are afraid of missing Olympic qualification. The women's teams also lose the Cup QFs. The format changes affect both the men's and women's tournament.
This is also nonsense:
They fear it will affect their Tokyo 2020 Olympic qualification hopes ...The top 4 ranked teams from the 2018/2019 Series have already qualified for the Olympics and so has host country Japan. The other places for the Olympics have been and will be played for via Regional qualfication tournaments, and - for one spot - a World Rugby Olympic Repechage tournament. So whatever happens during the 2019/2020 World Series will not affect Olympic qualification at all.
The 2020 ranking may - possibly - affect the Olympics' draw (I haven't looked that up), but definitely not qualification.
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All Blacks 7s squad named for Hamilton.
I wonder where Caleb Clarke is? Blues could definitely use him!
https://www.allblacks.com/news/all-blacks-sevens-looking-forward-to-home-advantage/
Head Coach Clark Laidlaw has named the All Blacks Sevens side who will look to continue the form which sees them sit atop the World Series standings. The squad is; Kurt Baker Dylan Collier Scott Curry Sam Dickson Vilimoni Koroi Tim Mikkelson Ngarohi McGarvey-Black Sione Molia Tone Ng Shiu Etene Nanai-Seturo Salesi Rayasi Regan Ware Joe Webber Changes from the side that won the Cape Town crown last month see Sione Molia return from injury along with Vilimoni Koroi and Etene Nanai-Seturo who are included for the first time since their Mitre 10 Cup commitments.
