Super Rugby’s next partnership will be with Japan

May 23, 2026 — 7:00am

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Super Rugby Pacific will prioritise consolidation over the next few years, but change is inevitable over the mid-term horizon.

Japan, with its timezone-friendly schedule – a 7pm kickoff in Tokyo is 8pm in Sydney – will be the expansion destination, not South Africa, despite this week’s headlines about the South Africans’ troubles in European competitions.

But don’t bet on a Sunwolves revival. Instead, put a Yen or two on the top Japanese Rugby League One clubs facing the best of the 10-team Super Rugby Pacific competition in a Champions Cup-style format.

The gravitational pull of money and shared high-performance goals is bringing those competitions ever closer.

Put the South Africans in the “horse-has-bolted” category. They invested large sums of money to join European club rugby, presumably miscalculating that it would open the door to the Six Nations, and they aren’t coming back.

Besides, the costs for all parties are too great to justify the revenue upside. For........

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