Could Rugby Have Its Own Superbowl

Today lots of people would have woken up ridiculously tired after watching which was probably one of the greatest Superbowls in years as Russell Wilson brought the literal term to ‘throwing the game’ to hand the win to the New England Patriots.

It didn’t matter if you were a Hawks or Pats fan or even a neutral watching for the first time as millions of people in the UK would have watched the game at home, on laptops or even having parties and with the confetti now settled and hangovers coming to an end but now comes the question. Could our sport have its own Superbowl?

Honestly, no because our sports like football, rugby and cricket as well as loads more, they don’t have the razzmatazz to pull it off, while our sports don’t have the stoppages for adverts and our half time aren’t long enough for a huge Katy Perry esque halftime show. The only sport which could bring the feel of a Superbowl and have space for adverts is darts but darts isn’t a sport.

Then you have football fans saying why not the FA Cup? The only problem with the FA Cup it's surrounded by history and the old, white executives at the FA are blind to new ideas and youthful thinking plus the advertising space isn’t in football.

So the sport and competition, which could bring the best chances of having a Superbowl type of hype, excitement and probably media interest is rugby and the match which has the best of doing so is: Champions Cup Winner vs Super Rugby Winner

Here are my reasons.

You have the best rugby club team in the Northern hemisphere against the best rugby team in the Southern hemisphere! How great would it have been to have seen Toulon and Chiefs play in a neutral destination to truly crown the BEST RUGBY CLUB IN THE WORLD and if there’s a chance of gaining interest why not have it in the States.

Unlike the FA Cup, the Champions Cup is a brand new competition so there’s new, exciting prospects they can bring to rugby and with the excitement around the final round of the group stages with at least 10 teams fighting for seven seeds (Toulon qualified in round five). Now you look at the knockout stages and you can give reasons for any of the teams left fighting to why they could/should win it.

So if you have the best club team in the Northern hemisphere you need a team which could match them and bring the best fight so you bring the best club rugby team from the Southern Hemisphere’s Super Rugby. 

If you don’t know Super Rugby is basically the Aviva Premiership with teams from South Africa, Australia and New Zealand and much like the Premiership there are a number of teams who could win it. Now, having Super Rugby teams coming to the Northern hemisphere is taking a slow pace as in recent years Saracens have welcomed clubs from South Africa to have a pre season friendly.

Let’s be honest, they’re not that exciting because Sarries normally field a weaken 15 due to Six Nations and LV Cup duties so they’re highly beatable shown last Saturday, I do think however, if both sides fielded strong teams then they would be great games.

So say if Leinster won the Champions Cup and Crusaders went on to lift the Super Rugby trophy. You can stage the match in New York because if you think about it, there’s a huge Irish population in the Big Apple so they’d want to see the game and I’m sure they’ll be loads of people would support the Kiwi side as well and if there was a good deal for fans of both clubs to fly over then I think they be interested in going.

If you look at the interest when the All Blacks played USA it was the highest attended rugby match in America ever and I know that’s not saying much, but it’s a good start and I wrote a piece about increasing America’s interest in rugby http://donttouchtheball.blogspot.co.uk/2014/11/usa-sleeping-giant-of-world-rugby.html.

This could help and if you get advertising men involved and instead of a halftime show have a kick ass pre game show with the Foo Fighters or something and with many people, including myself, don’t have a problem staying up late if the ad men want to get full value but you’ll have to think about THREE different time zones.

I know this is a pipe dream and lots of you have your own feelings and could shoot holes in my theory but you have to admit it’s something to think about.