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Former Irish and British Lions captain and Irish prostitute Keith Wood questioned the purpose of including cheetahs and kings in the PRO14 competition.
The two South African franchises were included in the main Celtic Rugby tournament as PRO12 expanded to PRO14 in 2017 after the Cheetahs and Kings were left out of Vodacom Super Rugby.
In their first season of PRO14, which started shortly after the end of the 2017 Super Rugby season, the Cheetahs made it to the playoffs where they lost to finalists Scarlets in Wales. The Bloemfontein-based team was also on track to reach the quarterfinals before the Covid-19 pandemic halted the current 2019-20 season.
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The Kings, meanwhile, have struggled for any form of consistency in the tournament, winning just four games and drawing one in their three seasons. With just one win this season, the Port Elizabeth-based team was set to finish the bottom of their conference for the third time in a row.
Touching on where rugby might be headed after the coronavirus crisis, Wood, who played 58 test matches for Ireland between 1994 and 2003, said the inclusion of cheetahs and kings in the PRO14 tournament was a “waste of time “
“For me PRO 14, I don’t like it as a competition,” Wood said. ‘I have never understood correctly, I understand it because Italy is in the Six Nations, the need to put the Italian teams, without history, without sense of rivalry, in the middle of a Celtic competition.
‘And the South African teams for me, I think they are an absolute waste of time. In terms of player welfare, deciding mid-season, especially for international players, suddenly having to jump in and play a game at the Highveld is not particularly correct for me.
“I would love to have a British and Irish League,” he added. “Because I think the sense of rivalry that we see in the Six Nations can be reflected in a club game with Leicester and Leinster or Munster.”
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Photo: Seb Daly / Sportsfile / Gallo Images
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