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Hernandez backs Jaguares to ditch Super Rugby and join SLAR

Argentina legend Juan Martin Hernandez /Getty

Pumas’ legend Juan Martín Hernández is backing Los Jaguares to look at potentially joining the Súper Liga Americana de Rugby (SLAR) amid an uncertain future for Super Rugby.

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Los Jaguares have been decimated in 2020. Earlier this year the club effectively informed their players that they are free to pursue contracts elsewhere following the break-up of Super Rugby and with talks in Australia, New Zealand and South Africa ongoing, the future of the multi-nation tournament appears to be up the air.

SLAR, South America’s new professional league, could be a ready-made alternative for a homeless Jaguares franchise.

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Reds hooker Brandon Paenga-Amosa and centre Hunter Paisami – Super Rugby AU Final

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Reds hooker Brandon Paenga-Amosa and centre Hunter Paisami – Super Rugby AU Final

SLAR consists of six teams, with five of those sides – from Argentina, Uruguay, Chile, Paraguay and Brazil – competing in a regular-season that, upon its conclusion, the top four sides will go into the playoffs. The fifth-placed side will enter the Challenge Trophy with Cafeteros Pro, a club from Medellín in Colombia who are not a full participant for the debut season.

SLAR would offer a more local tournament and although the standard is nowhere near that of Super Rugby, it is a league ripe for development.

In need of high-grade competition, Hernández believes that SLAR could be a good long term solution to the Jaguares and to Los Pumas’ conundrum. In an interview with La Pleno de Rugby, the mercurial playmaker said current players could “be here or they could train to play for Ceibos, Corinthians or in Uruguay, Selknam or wherever. If we can train those players at a regional level and the level grows, at some point it will be interesting, it will be very competitive and it will be very good. But it is very long term.”

“Some have already decided to go abroad and for those that are, the most difficult point is how to maintain the level of these players. If they are going to play in the Rugby Championship, then what competition will they have to prepare with?”

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“I think that the Liga Sudamericana is going to be very important. Not in the short-term, it won’t provide the level or quality to b able to play in the Rugby Championship in the short-term.  Nonetheless, I think that it is very useful for the medium and long-term; in two, three, four, or five years time it is going to be spectacular.”

He argues that having more than one team in SLAR could potentially give Los Pumas increased depth in each position compared to the current set up, where the Jaguares more or less supply every position in the team from a single feeder club, occasionally dipping into European players stocks as needed.

“In the Rugby Championship you compete against New Zealand, South Africa, Australia, who when choosing a prop have four others who are starting players in their Super Rugby franchises.  One of them plays, but the others are at the highest level. There are ten loose heads to select from. So, in an ideal world there would be more Argentine franchises to provide for Los Pumas, more Argentine franchises in one place that could compete in Super Rugby to have more options.”

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J
JW 3 hours ago
'Passionate reunion of France and New Zealand shows Fabien Galthie is wrong to rest his stars'

Ok, managed to read the full article..

... New Zealand’s has only 14 and the professional season is all over within four months. In France, club governance is the responsibility of an independent organisation [the Ligue Nationale de Rugby or LNR] which is entirely separate from the host union [the Fédération Française de Rugby or FFR]. Down south New Zealand Rugby runs the provincial and the national game.

That is the National Provincial Championship, a competition of 14 representative union based teams run through the SH international window and only semi professional (paid only during it's running). It is run by NZR and goes for two and a half months.


Super Rugby is a competition involving 12 fully professional teams, of which 5 are of New Zealand eligibility, and another joint administered team of Pacific Island eligibility, with NZR involvement. It was a 18 week competition this year, so involved (randomly chosen I believe) extra return fixtures (2 or 3 home and away derbys), and is run by Super Rugby Pacific's own independent Board (or organisation). The teams may or may not be independently run and owned (note, this does not necessarily mean what you think of as 'privately owned').


LNR was setup by FFR and the French Government to administer the professional game in France. In New Zealand, the Players Association and Super Rugby franchises agreed last month to not setup their own governance structure for professional rugby and re-aligned themselves with New Zealand Rugby. They had been proposing to do something like the English model, I'm not sure how closely that would have been aligned to the French system but it did not sound like it would have French union executive representation on it like the LNR does.

In the shaky isles the professional pyramid tapers to a point with the almighty All Blacks. In France the feeling for country is no more important than the sense of fierce local identity spawned at myriad clubs concentrated in the southwest. Progress is achieved by a nonchalant shrug and the wide sweep of nuanced negotiation, rather than driven from the top by a single intense focus.

Yes, it is pretty much a 'representative' selection system at every level, but these union's are having to fight for their existence against the regime that is NZR, and are currently going through their own battle, just as France has recently as I understand it. A single focus, ala the French game, might not be the best outcome for rugby as a whole.


For pure theatre, it is a wonderful article so far. I prefer 'Ntamack New Zealand 2022' though.

The young Crusader still struggles to solve the puzzle posed by the shorter, more compact tight-heads at this level but he had no problem at all with Colombe.

It was interesting to listen to Manny during an interview on Maul or Nothing, he citied that after a bit of banter with the All Black's he no longer wanted one of their jersey's after the game. One of those talks was an eye to eye chat with Tamaiti Williams, there appear to be nothing between the lock and prop, just a lot of give and take. I thought TW angled in and caused Taylor to pop a few times, and that NZ were lucky to be rewarded.

f you have a forward of 6ft 8ins and 145kg, and he is not at all disturbed by a dysfunctional set-piece, you are in business.

He talked about the clarity of the leadership that helped alleviate any need for anxiety at the predicaments unfolding before him. The same cannot be said for New Zealand when they had 5 minutes left to retrieve a match winning penalty, I don't believe. Did the team in black have much of a plan at any point in the game? I don't really call an autonomous 10 vehicle they had as innovative. I think Razor needs to go back to the dealer and get a new game driver on that one.

Vaa’i is no match for his power on the ground. Even in reverse, Meafou is like a tractor motoring backwards in low gear, trampling all in its path.

Vaa'i actually stops him in his tracks. He gets what could have been a dubious 'tackle' on him?

A high-level offence will often try to identify and exploit big forwards who can be slower to reload, and therefore vulnerable to two quick plays run at them consecutively.

Yes he was just standing on his haunches wasn't he? He mentioned that in the interview, saying that not only did you just get up and back into the line to find the opposition was already set and running at you they also hit harder than anything he'd experienced in the Top 14. He was referring to New Zealands ultra-physical, burst-based Super style of course, which he was more than a bit surprised about. I don't blame him for being caught out.


He still sent the obstruction back to the repair yard though!

What wouldn’t the New Zealand rugby public give to see the likes of Mauvaka and Meafou up front..

Common now Nick, don't go there! Meafou showed his Toulouse shirt and promptly got his citizenship, New Zealand can't have him, surely?!?


As I have said before with these subjects, really enjoy your enthusiasm for their contribution on the field and I'd love to see more of their shapes running out for Vern Cotter and the like styled teams.

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