Jurgen Klopp called UEFA's Nations League the "most senseless competition in football" over the weekend, but European football's monetising revolutionising of international friendlies has not gone unnoticed elsewhere.
World Rugby have been toying with the idea of introducing a new international competition to further monetise the cross-hemisphere Test matches that fill Summer and Autumn.
It has been tentatively titled the 'League of Nations' (although this one might not suffer for the absence of the United States).
It is proposed that it is staged during non-World Cup years, and would feature the world's top 12 teams - six from either hemisphere. They would face off on a league basis, with the top 4 qualifying for the title playoffs.
The first leg of the league would be the Six Nations and Rugby Championship, and the cross-hemisphere games would take place in what are now the June/July and November Test windows.
World Rugby CEO Brett Gosper backed the plan in an interview with Sydney's Daily Telegraph. "It just makes sense and it would seem to be the time to do this and there's a consensus and a desire to try", Gosper said.
It is all subject to a feasibility study, but it has been rumoured that the competition could kick off as early as 2020.
It sounds interesting, but if it were to go ahead, how does the Lions Series survive?
[Daily Telegraph]
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