Rugby Challenge (South Africa)
Current season, competition or edition: 2017 Rugby Challenge
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Competition logo
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| Sport | Rugby union |
|---|---|
| Founded | 2017 |
| Inaugural season | 2017 |
| No. of teams | 15 |
| Country |
South Africa, Namibia |
| Sponsor(s) | SuperSport |
| Related competitions |
Currie Cup |
The Rugby Challenge – known as the SuperSport Rugby Challenge for sponsorship reasons – is the secondary domestic rugby union competition in South Africa. The competition is organised by the South African Rugby Union and featured all fourteen South African provincial unions plus Namibian side the Welwitschias. The inaugural season of the competition was in 2017, set up as the long-term successor of the Vodacom Cup competition.
The competition is played at roughly the same time as Super Rugby each season, and features a combination of Super Rugby players returning from injury, reserve players attempting to maintain their fitness levels and younger players trying to break through to the Super Rugby or Currie Cup sides. It therefore serves as an important developmental competition for South African rugby.
The fifteen teams are geographically divided into three sections – a Northern Section, Central Section and a Southern Section. Each team would play the other teams in their section twice during the regular season, once at home and once away (although some fixtures were moved to a neutral venue as part of a "SuperStack" initiative, which means that three matches – including amateur club matches – would be played back-to-back at one venue). The winner and runner-up of each section would qualify to the Quarter Finals, along with the two third-placed teams with the best records.
The teams that compete in the Rugby Challenge are:
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