How would England fare in European Super League

The prospect of a ‘European Super League’, very much mirroring the format of Super Rugby in the southern hemisphere, has been discussed at length for years now.

The debate was given fresh impetuous recently by Toulon owner Mourad Boudjellal, who has argued that the Champions Cup should be scrapped and a European league formed to take its place.

In Boudjellal’s vision, a 20-team league, with two 10-team conferences, would be formed, consisting of six French, six English and eight other teams, presumably three Welsh, three Irish and two Scottish/one Scottish and one Italian.

It’s an unlikely prospect for a multitude of reasons but with professional rugby a fairly recent concept, it is a sport much more amenable to drastic overhauls and changes such as this and there’s no doubt that the poor performances of the European nations at the Rugby World Cup last year will have given this idea some extra legs.

So how, should any kind of European Super Rugby format be introduced, would England cope with the change? Would they have the pool and, most importantly, quality of players to put together five franchises as New Zealand and Australia do?

They would still be financially better off than their southern hemisphere counterparts and able to attract big name signings, but a key factor would be that they would need at least two English players in every position, lest the England national team struggle as a result of less representation at the elite level of European rugby.

The country would also need to be split, with franchises representing five distinct regions. These would likely be the West Country, London and the home counties, the East Midlands, the West Midlands and the North.

Divvying up players between the five sides would be a nightmare but one which the English player pool seems capable of fulfilling and keeping all five sides highly competitive. Below are the top 10 English or English-qualified players in each position shared out equally amongst the five sides, with preference given to players’ current geographic location where possible. The presence of certain of players and omission of others can be quibbled over, but this is just to demonstrate the depth and potential quality of the sides, rather than an ironclad statement of who would be involved and who wouldn’t.

	London	West Country	East Midlands	West Midlands	North
LH	Mako Vunipola	Nick Auterac	Alex Waller	Matt Mullan	Joe Marler
	Richard Barrington	Nathan Catt	Ethan Waller	Alec Hepburn	Ross Harrison
TH	Kyle Sinckler	Henry Thomas	Dan Cole	Paul Hill	Kieran Brookes
	Kieran Longbottom	Jake Cooper-Woolley	Fraser Balmain	Nick Schonert	Scott Wilson
HK	Jamie George	Luke Cowan-Dickie	Tom Youngs	Dylan Hartley	George McGuigan
	Ross Batty	Jack Yeandle	Mike Haywood	Tommy Taylor	Jack Walker
LL	Maro Itoje	Dave Attwood	Courtney Lawes	Joe Launchbury	Ed Slater
	Charlie Matthews	Charlie Ewels	Mike Fitzgerald	James Gaskell	Dom Barrow
RL	George Kruis	Matt Symons	Graham Kitchener	Geoff Parling	Michael Patterson
	Sam Twomey	Elliot Stooke	Mike Williams	Tom Ellis	Tom Savage
BF	Chris Robshaw	Dave Ewers	Tom Wood	Jamie Gibson	Tom Croft
	Jackson Wray	Matt Garvey	Teimana Harrison	Sam Jones	Will Welch
OF	Will Fraser	Matt Kvesic	Brendon O’Connor	James Haskell	Calum Clark
	Jack Clifford	Luke Wallace	Matt Hankin	Dave Ward	Harry Thacker
N8	Billy Vunipola	Ben Morgan	Lachlan McCaffrey	Nathan Hughes	Josh Beaumont
	James Chisholm	Thomas Waldrom	Sam Dickinson	Lewis Ludlow	Phil Dowson
SH	Danny Care	Will Chudley	Ben Youngs	Joe Simpson	Lee Dickson
	Ben Spencer	Chris Cook	Sam Harrison	Dan Robson	Richard Wigglesworth
FH	Owen Farrell	Henry Slade	Freddie Burns	Danny Cipriani	George Ford
	Theo Brophy Clews	Billy Burns	Stephen Myler	Alex Lozowski	Ben Botica
IC	Brad Barritt	Sam Hill	Manu Tuilagi	Kyle Eastmond	Ryan Mills
	Johnny Williams	Ollie Devoto	Harry Mallinder	Billy Twelvetrees	Harry Sloan
OC	Elliot Daly	Jonathan Joseph	Luther Burrell	Ben Te’o	Sam James
	Nick Tompkins	Henry Trinder	Tom Stephenson	Tom Fowlie	Mat Tait
LW	Marland Yarde	Semesa Rokoduguni	Matt Banahan	Jonny May	James Short
	Topsy Ojo	Henry Purdy	Tom Collins	Olly Woodburn	Will Addison
RW	Chris Ashton	Jack Nowell	Alex Lewington	Christian Wade	Marcus Watson
	Mike Ellery	Nev Edwards	Jamie Elliot	Charlie Sharples	Tom Brady
FB	Mike Brown	Anthony Watson	Ben Foden	Alex Goode	Mike Haley
	Ollie Lindsay-Hague	Tom Homer	Rob Miller	Chris Pennell	Simon Hammersley

 

The above players are just those established in the Premiership and doesn’t include players still breaking through. It’s a fanciful allocation of players, but does demonstrate the potential England have should any overhaul of the European league and/or cup system take place.

The reality is that with independent ownership of clubs and the Premiership thriving, all the odds are stacked against any such competition coming into being. As appealing as it might be to some to see franchises consisting of almost entirely English players throwing the ball about in a summer season, there are just too many obstacles in place to consider it a reality at this moment in time.

The current balance between club and country in England works and we’re starting to see the improvements made at academy level over the last five years filter through to success at European and international levels. It would be far better to tweak that than scrap everything and start again on a wing and a prayer, as tempting as the potential results may be.