As the code continues to wait on the outcome of the arbitration hearing between the Australian Rugby Union and the Western Force, Japanese officials are becoming increasingly worried the Sunwolves could become the team axed from Super Rugby.
If the ARU is forced to go to SANZAAR and admit that it cannot honour the promise it made in London in March to deliver only four Australian teams next season, then SANZAAR will face the problem of trying to make a 16-team competition work or continuing with its plan to cut back to 15 sides.
That leaves the Sunwolves in the most vulnerable position, as the worst-performing side in Super Rugby during the two years it has been in the competition. It finished with the wooden spoon last year and second-last this season.
“If they can’t get rid of a fifth Australian team, do SANZAAR stick with a 15-team competition?” a Sunwolves source posed to
The Australian yesterday. “If they do, then they will have to make a decision on who that other team is.”
Asked if the Sunwolves, who already have been told to lift their game by SANZAAR, considered themselves under threat, the source replied, “I imagine we would be.”
The Australian experience would suggest that any move to cull the Japanese side would end in the courts, although the Participation Agreement does include clauses that make it possible to remove any team under certain circumstances.
For the moment, all these threats are purely hypothetical, though certainly not out of the question. But there was nothing hypothetical in the news yesterday that the Sunwolves have missed out on one of Japan’s form players when Amanaki Mafi re-signed with the Rebels.
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