It’s been a few weeks since we last reported on Super Six and in that time there have been a few developments. Firstly the fixtures have now been released and can be seen in full at:
https://www.scottishrugby.org/news/super6-season-and-broadcast-fixtures-announced
The matches are split across the whole weekend including Friday evenings so there will indeed be conflict with Pro14 matches and club and school fixtures etc. but it’s hard to see when else they could be played.
BBC Scotland have also been brought on board with one match every weekend (the Sunday match) being broadcast live on the BBC Scotland sport Website. This is a good thing for coverage of the game in this country, and has a feel of the old Rugby Special about it!
The inaugural Super Six final will be broadcast live on BBC Scotland TV the weekend of 27-29 March 2020.
There has also been some signing and naming news from the clubs.
Stirling County have decided that their team will be known as ….. Stirling County. They have also announced a raft of players. Adam Wood, George Arnott, Ross Bundy, Murphy Walker, Cameron Henderson, Grant Hughes, Andrew Goudie, Andrew Mclean, Billy Dineen, Logan Trotter, James Pow, and Reyner Kennedy all of who were County players last season.
Recently released from Edinburgh, Sean Kennedy has also joined County on a partnership deal with Glasgow Warriors. It remains to be seen how his time will be split.
Warriors utility man Pete Horne has also agreed to join the coaching team at Bridgehaugh.
Boroughmuir’s Super Six team will be known as Boroughmuir Bears. The logo for this side is, well, a bear, but with the tag line – “Grizzly opponents since 1919” below it, for a bit of fun.
Ayr will be Ayrshire Bulls and to mark the occasion of their re-branding they announced that Japan hopeful and current Scottish Internationalist Gordon Reid will be joining them in a move to spend more time in Scotland with his family while still keeping at least one foot in rugby boots.
Frazer Climo who has been an Ayr regular for the past 4 seasons has also been confirmed as joining the Super Six side as both player and skills coach.
Melrose have gone full tilt boogie and re-branded their Super Six side as Southern Knights and intimated this with a very professional, if somewhat cheesy, promo video that seeks to explain the name. The construction of their 3G pitch at the Greenyards continues.
Heriots – no news
Watsonians – are retaining the status quo with regard to the name of their Super Six side. They have also revealed that Edinburgh and Scotland tighthead WP Nel will be on the coaching team.
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7 responses
3rd week of August and not a single “transfer” announced to a Super 6 club yet from another Premier 1 club. Stirling County have announced 12 signings, all County players last year. Sean Kennedy and Gordon Reid have been announced as returning from pro ranks. But no one else. Do we assume those who don’t feature next weekend for their clubs are going to be playing super 6? A strange moratorium by the SRU as they try to build excitement or an indicator that there aren’t many players from outwith the host clubs signing up?
Moody, I’m starting to find it all a bit odd to be honest. I’m keen to support this league, have written about it in a broadly positive tone and have even copied in all 6 clubs in my last tweet about this article and none of them have responded in any fashion. I know this isn’t the mainstream press but surely if you are trying to promote something, especially when its not been universally popular, you might want to grab every ounce of free positive publicity you can get. I’ll keep trying.
I am very keen to support this in the hope that it’ll improve the player exposure to a wider network and hopefully play cross border etc in the way that the B&I Cup used to.
Unfortunately what it would ‘appear’ to be doing is just promoting 1XV players into a new ‘Scottish Premiership’
Take Ayr for example, granted they have signed Gordon Reid (probably coming to the end of his career anyway) but if they had 3 teams before ie; Ayr 1XV, Ayr 2XV and Millbrae (3XV) then what they have now done is have Ayrshire Bulls, Ayr 1XV and Ayr 2XV/Millbrae.
My question, is the new ‘Semi Pro’ league just becoming a newly branded premiership unless we actually create competition and play cross border?
Angus, cross border fixtures will be between May – April v the top six sides in Welsh domestic rugby. It’s true that the new league is not creating any new players but it will hopefully make those chosen into better players. We will see if that is the case in due course.
I may have missed it somewhere, but I assume the usual pro player draft will be happening again this year but in a more condensed format? So the Glasgow and Edinburgh pros (and academy players) will all be assigned to a super six club for when they aren’t required in the pro set up.
If this is indeed the case, the impact of the geographical split will be keenly felt by the west coast players. Surely cant all be drafted to Ayr/Stirling, and my understanding of the programme, from speaking to a few players and coaches, is that they are expected to attend regular training sessions to keep up to date with line out calls etc.
Ross, I think there will be a draft. Some Glasgow players will undoubtedly be drafted to Ayr and Stirling but last year some were also drafted to Currie Chieftains. Its not a huge stretch from there to Meggetland or Myreside.
I still don’t understand the way the teams are geographically.
There are 5 regions in the SRU club section, East, Glasgow South, Glasgow North, Caledonia Midland and Caledonia North.
One team should have been from each region then add an extra one in the east region.
I do think that the clubs are trying to ‘extend’ their reach with their rebranding, which will be good in future.
Hopefully this can provide the development pathway needed.