Change in competition structure confirmed for 2015

Tawa supporters cheering their team on at this year’s Jubilee Cup final. From 2015 the Jubilee Cup will remain unchanged, but there will be changes to the first round Swindale Shield competition.

A new competition structure was accepted at a Wellington Club Rugby Board meeting last night, it has been confirmed this afternoon.

Wellington’s Premier club rugby format is set to change for the first time in more than 20 years, and will be put in place for the 2015 season.

The revised format will mark the end of promotion-relegation matches, giving all Wellington’s clubs the opportunity to enter the Swindale Shield each year, providing they fit the necessary criteria.

Much of the criteria is yet to be finalised but a key one will be the requirement that each Premier club also fields teams in the Premier Reserve and Colts competitions. All three teams will play at the same venue each week.

With the demands of the representative season, the competition will still be held within a 20-week window, with the structure of the second round Jubilee Cup of a full round-robin and playoffs to remain unchanged.

The Swindale Shield competition format will be adjusted based on the number of clubs that apply for Premier status each year.

The current competition format will remain in 2014, with the removal of the promotion-relegation at the end of the second round.

The last significant change to the competition was in 1992, when the? Swindale Shield was expanded to a 16-team “Club Rugby Premiership” competition, with clubs split into two divisions based on the previous year’s Jubilee Cup and Hardham Cup rankings.

For many years, 14 teams played a 13-game round robin for the first round ?championship (for the Swindale Shield from 1969), followed by a top six format over five rounds with no playoff series to decide the Jubilee Cup champion. The draw for the second round was made so that generally the leading two sides would meet in the main game on Athletic Park on the last afternoon of the season in an unofficial 'final'.

The second round was in turn modified for a time in the 1970s? with 12 teams divided into ‘Gold’ and ‘Black’ sections that played in cross pools to decide the Jubilee Cup finalist. This was largely put in place to maintain interest in an era dominated by Petone.

In 1994 this was changed to a 14-team first round competition comprising 12 Premier clubs and the Marist St Pat’s and Petone B teams. The B teams were replaced by two more standalone club sides in 1995.

In 1996 the Swindale Shield was trimmed to its present format of 12 teams vying for top eight places for the Jubilee Cup. For the record those teams were: Avalon*, Harlequins (Old Boys University), Hutt Old Boys Marist, Johnsonville*, Marist St Pat's, Northern United, Petone, Poneke, Tawa, Upper Hutt, Wellington*, Western Suburbs.* Senior 1 club in 2013.

Meanwhile, the Wellington Club Rugby Board unanimously gave support to the formation of a new rugby club in Upper Hutt City (combining Upper Hutt and Rimutaka) for the 2014 season. Details of the new combined club and an official announcement will be forthcoming soon.