‘Distinct possibility’ that 2020 international rugby calendar be scrapped

17 April 2020 - 13:39 By Liam Del Carme
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World Rugby Chairman Bill Beaumont attends a ceremony to launch France's plans to host the 2023 Rugby World Cup, by signing the founding charter of the public body that will organize the championship, at the Stade de France stadium in St Denis, north of Paris on March 10, 2018.
World Rugby Chairman Bill Beaumont attends a ceremony to launch France's plans to host the 2023 Rugby World Cup, by signing the founding charter of the public body that will organize the championship, at the Stade de France stadium in St Denis, north of Paris on March 10, 2018.
Image: Francois Mori / POOL / AFP

The boss of World Rugby has conceded it is a “distinct possibility” the international rugby union calendar could be scrapped this year due to Covid-19.

Bill Beaumont‚ World Rugby’s chairman‚ has admitted the 2020 calendar hangs in the balance with the Six Nations on ice and the July internationals increasingly unlikely to take place as scheduled.

The Rugby Championship in August and September and the November internationals in the northern hemisphere may yet go ahead as scheduled but it will require many governments around the world getting a handle on the pandemic. There is no clear evidence that that is the case.

With Super Rugby already unlikely to restart SA Rugby were hoping to mitigate some of their losses in the July Tests against Scotland (two) and Georgia. The Rugby Championship has been one of its bankers as a reliable source of income but now that too seems in the balance.

Beaumont admitted some matches may have to be rescheduled for next year.

“That is a distinct possibility‚” he told London’s the Times. “The pressures on the unions are getting greater and greater.”

World Rugby has‚ however‚ made available a relief package of $100m (R1.8 billion) in the form of low interest loans to national federations under its aegis.

Already salary cuts and freezes are the order of the day with the game’s highest earners hit hardest.

The crisis comes at a time Beaumont is running for re-election for World Rugby’s highest office but he is being opposed by deputy chairman Agustin Pichot.

Former England Rugby World Cup-winning coach Clive Woodward has thrown his weight behind Pichot suggesting “rugby would benefit from being viewed through the eyes of leader who is 45‚ not 68”. It clearly ruffled his former England and British and Irish Lions teammate’s feathers.

“What difference does the age make?” asked Beaumont. “I played my rugby always as an amateur. Does that mean I don’t understand the professional game?

“I am evolution‚ not revolution‚” he added. “I am bidding to show a lead to colleagues‚ to take colleagues with me. I intend to be a leader. And I think I have been in the past.”

Pichot has been campaigning on a ticket promising sweeping change to rugby’s well entrenched old order. World Rugby’s council will cast their vote electronically later this month with the result due to be announced on May 12.

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