Rassie Erasmus has expressed his excitement at the possibility of a global calendar becoming a reality after it was revealed recently that crunch talks on the matter are set to take place next month.<\/p>\n
Last week, it was revealed that the long-standing topic of aligning the northern and southern hemispheres\u2019 respective calendars will receive attention as World Rugby aim to achieve synergy for the first time since the game turned professional in 1995.<\/p>\n
According to a Midi Olympique report, a meeting for rugby\u2019s bigwigs is set to take place in London in mid-February to iron out differences and find common ground regarding alignment on the global calendar.<\/p>\n
Los Pumas scrum-half and ex-World Rugby vice-chairman Agustin Pichot<\/a> will lead the discussions on behalf of the SANZAAR countries \u2013 Argentina, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa.<\/p>\n Erasmus<\/a> made his position known on the global calendar last October during a press conference after the announcement of the Rugby\u2019s Greatest Rivalry tour, when the Springboks<\/a> coach said: \u201cI don\u2019t want this to be a headline; this is just my opinion, and I don\u2019t want to go against the wishes of SA Rugby or what they are thinking.<\/p>\n \u201cBut I think it would be fantastic if we could all play the Rugby Championship in February, when the Six Nations is on.<\/p>\n \u2018Much easier to know all the teams and be aligned\u2019<\/p>\n \u201cIt would be much easier to know all the teams and be aligned, rather than having some countries flat in June and others peak in November, and then we are flat at that time.<\/p>\n \u201cTo implement law variations right across the board would be so much easier because all competition will start at the same time.\u201d<\/p>\n Erasmus expanded on those comments by saying that he is encouraged that the matter is being taken seriously, and although he has no idea when a global calendar will eventually be implemented, it\u2019s good that progress is being made regarding it.<\/p>\n Deja vu for Pieter-Steph du Toit as Rassie Erasmus reveals full extent of Springboks star\u2019s latest injury<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s real talks about it. When you\u2019re in meetings and you start looking at calendars and you think what can work and what can\u2019t work and then some people voiced it out publicly,\u201d he said on Monday.<\/p>\n \u201cThen some people took the route to get it done and it looks like everybody\u2019s taking it seriously now to do it.\u201d<\/p>\n He said getting everybody on the same page with regards to a global calendar would be especially beneficial to players, while there would also be improvements to other important aspects of the game.<\/p>\n \u2018It will sort out a lot of problems for us\u2019<\/p>\n \u201cI think it will sort out a lot of problems for us. Players resting or managing the number of games a player can play, so getting it synced, I think player welfare and rules of competitions, all those kinds of things are easier to implement and to adapt to.<\/p>\n \u201cSo, it looks like they\u2019ll keep putting questionnaires out and high-performance committees looking at it. I\u2019m not sure where it is (negotiations regarding it at the moment) and when it will start, but I think it will be awesome.\u201d<\/p>\n Erasmus also explained how certain law changes would be easier to implement due to a global calendar with the 20-minute red card, which was initially introduced in the Rugby Championship but not used in the northern hemisphere.<\/p>\n \u201cIt syncs everything,\u201d he explained. \u201cOur players (will) have a pre-season, now they go into a series (and) you know when it gets bad, some players (might) get banned in November, maybe not as black and white like that, but it influenced banning, it influenced a pre-season that we have sometimes.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd some players have played in the Six Nations, then a new law that\u2019s coming in, and you\u2019re only playing in June, so the global calendar will help that.\u201d<\/p>\n Want more from Planet Rugby? Add us as a preferred source on Google to your favourites list<\/a> for world-class coverage you can trust.<\/p>\n