International rugby is over for now, and at last we can turn our attention back to the URC. For a week at least, and then it’s the Champions Cup. Oh, and international rugby isn’t over just yet for two of the URC’s nations. Hmm… maybe the rugby calendar isn’t that well organised and should be sorted out… Anyway, I digress. Enough with that trivial stuff, let’s get on to what’s really important – power rankings!
We’re only 5 weeks into the club season so the table is yet to really shake out and show us a true picture of who’s strong, who’s a contender and who just isn’t quite good enough to really compete. Fear not, Gameline Sports is here to help. Here we’ve complied our rankings of how we really think these teams stack up against each other.
1 Stormers
This Cape Town based, former URC champion team has stormed out to an early lead in the table. Apologies, I couldn’t help myself. No more bad puns for the rest of these Power Rankings, I promise. What’s been so impressive about their start to the season is the manner of their victories. They haven’t conceded more than 16 points in any game, whilst scoring at least 26 themselves. All this puts their points difference at +118 through 5 rounds.
With Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu having come of age, and his combination with Damian Willemse clicking the way Stormers fans have dreamt of, this team has all the tools to mount another title run. Their schedule does get tougher in the next block but right now they’re the standard bearers for the URC.
2 Leinster
Reminder, these are not the standings, these are who I think really are the best teams. That’s why the team sitting in 7th with 2 wins from 5 are my 2nd ranked side. I know, I know, they’ve looked poor this year, even when their full complement of Lions returned. And yes, there are general concerns about this crop of international stars aging et cetera… It’s still Leinster though. They still have the biggest budget by a mile and the most talent. Their best team is still stacked full of recent Lions and will soon add Rieko Ioane to their list of southern hemisphere superstars, with RG Synman and defence coach Jacques Nienaber. Not to mention their depth is so good that they’re built to win over a long, arduous season. They may have started slowly but the reigning champs will be just fine.
3 Munster
I used to not like Munster (mostly because they knocked my beloved Ospreys out of a few knockout games back in the days when we actually made it to knockout stages), but I’ve gone full 360 on that feeling. I respect the hell out of this club. They may not have the budget or plethora of internationals that their Dublin rivals boast, but they are true gamers. Always competitive and they know how to go on a cup run as well as anyone. Unbeaten to start the season and with a statement win over Leinster in the Aviva. This team will almost certainly be making the playoffs come the end of the season, and no one will want to play them.
I will apologise to Munster fans because you do kind of deserve to be ranked 2nd in this. But I’m putting Munster 3rd for now. Perhaps I’ll be proven wrong.
4 Glasgow Warriors
It’s been another strong start to the season for the 2023/24 champions, with a narrow loss away to Benetton their only defeat. They’re a good side, with arguably the best coach in the league in Franco Smith – who they’ll be grateful is still with them after all the rumours of international opportunities in the last year or so. Still waiting for Huw Jones and Zander Fagerson to return from injury, Glasgow will look to take this strong start and kick on in the next block of fixtures.
A couple seasons ago they shocked all of us when they went to South Africa and won the title. Now it’s no surprise to see them competing at the sharp end. They will absolutely have ambitions to regain their title and are a very real challenger.
5 Bulls
The Bulls are a physical team. They’re a nightmare to play against in Pretoria with the advantage of altitude sucking the energy from their opposition, just as you’re trying to defend against the likes of Canan Moodie, David Kriel and Willie Le Roux. So you don’t want an open, expansive game against them when they have those kinds of threats on the park, but equally they have a big, bruising pack which will beat you in an arm wrestle. The big news for this team has been the summer signing of two-time World Cup winning flyhalf Handre Pollard. He’s the super experienced leader and game manager that will make sure when they get into a tight game, they come out the right side of it. Honestly, the more I write, the more I think I have this team too low. I would hate to play this team in the playoffs at home, and definitely not away. They are certainly a title contender.
6 Cardiff
For all the doom and gloom in Welsh rugby right now, Cardiff need to be highlighted as a bright spot. A couple of years ago they had just 20 players at preseason, before a young squad surprised many with how competitive they were. Albeit the story week after week was how close they came, racking up plenty of losing bonus points but very few wins. Last year showed good progress and this year they’ve progressed even more. Those narrow defeats of a season or two ago are now turning into victories. All this from a team that lost their head coach to Wales just before the season started.
The key for Cardiff is to keep these wins coming. They benefit from the fact that they get to play the three other Welsh regions twice, giving them a slightly more favourable fixture list. Although derbies are never a forgone conclusion. The Christmas derby period will be big for Cardiff as they look to keep this momentum going and aim to make the knockouts for the first time since the league introduced them.
7 Ulster
Ulster are a good club that had a very disappointing last season, way off their usually high standards. So far it looks as though the Ulster we know are back. They started with 3 straight wins, but the highlight of that stretch has to be winning away in Durban against a fully loaded Sharks side, boasting their full compliment of South African internationals. To win down there is hugely impressive and shows not just quality but also strength of character. They’ve made two big signings this season – key word being ‘big’! Juarno Augustus has come over from Northampton after being one of the best back rowers in the PREM. He’s already made an impact, but he is also about to be joined by Wallabies bulldozer Angus Bell. Both of these guys are exceptional ball carriers and will bring size, physicality and fear factor to their pack. It remains to be seen if Ulster can continue these strong results, but they couldn’t ask for a better start to the season.
8 Edinburgh
The capital city club hasn’t had as much attention as their Scottish counterparts in recent seasons, but they’ve quietly been very competitive. They have some of Scotland’s most exciting backs with the likes of Duhan van der Merwe and Darcy Graham constantly competing with each other for the title of top try scorer. In the pack they’ve got a couple of tough South African props and will hope Ewan Ashman brings his mightily impressive Nations Series form back with him to the URC. They’ve had 3 really close losses on the road meaning they languish in 11th. How different it would look for them if they had been able to finish off those games. At the same time though, they’ve showed how competitive they can be, and when they get back on home turf they’ll feel confident they can come out the right side of games.
9 Benetton
Italy’s flagship side have had a mixed start to the season with a couple good home victories and a couple disappointing losses on the road. To be honest, that sentence could apply to half the league. With a large number of their side making up the core of an Italy team that has just beaten the Wallabies and fronted up to the Boks, they should come back into the next block of URC fixtures with confidence. They’re a strong team with a well financed squad so they’ll be hoping to see a little more return on investment soon. I do think they have the potential to really challenge at the top of this league, but their performances so far this year suggest that won’t be just yet.
10 Connacht
The Galway based side are another team that have been the wrong side of a few close fixtures. They haven’t won since the opening round, but they’ve been competitive in all their games, despite a tough schedule. They have a rugged pack that aren’t afraid to mix it, supplemented by the power of test Lion Bundee Aki in the centre. Josh Ioane is a really talented rugby player at 10, able to break open a defence with his running game, whilst Mack Hansen just seems to get better and better. Looking forward, Connacht have 3 very winnable games coming up. First a date at home with a Springbok-depleted Sharks side, followed by a trip to Newport and a Christmas derby at home to Ulster. 3 wins from 3 would go someway to igniting this side’s season.
11 Lions
They have 3 losses on the road and 2 comfortable wins at home in South Africa. That’s kind of how it is for this Lions team. They don’t have the big budgets and star internationals of the other 3 South African franchises. However they still have some very good players and are a tough team. Playing at home, in Ellis Park, they are very tough to beat. A key for them is winning as many of their home games as possible, particularly the derbies with their South African rivals. If they can do that then they will put themselves in a position to challenge for the top 8, provided they can turnover some sides on their trips up north. They seem to get slightly stronger each year and will want to keep that progress going.
12 Sharks
The Sharks are pretty frustrating at times. They’re doing so many good things off the field and on paper they have one of the strongest teams in World rugby. On the field however, they’re just so mid. I don’t know why they can’t translate talent to performances but every time you watch them they seem to underwhelm.
In fairness to them, they did put together some good results last season, finishing 4th in the table, a year after winning the Challenge Cup. So even though they feel like they disappoint you, they still have had solid success. They’ve dug themselves a bit of a hole at the start of this season though, picking up just 8 points from their opening 5 games. But when their Springbok contingent finish up their international responsibilities and switch their attention back to the URC, I could absolutely see this side turning it around. I really hope they do because they have so much potential. But they’ve got to prove it now.
13 Ospreys
The Ospreys had as tough a start to the season as you could imagine, playing the two best South African teams away. They didn’t win either game but they showed some good signs. Since returning home they’ve had a good win against Zebre, a disappointing home loss to Glasgow and their annual ‘How did you not win that?!?‘ at Rodney Parade. Overall it’s not the start they’d have hoped for. They’ve had a number of injuries in the backs that hasn’t helped and with Jac Morgan now unlikely to feature for them until after the 6 Nations, it’s not the most promising outlook.
However they are also consistently the best of Wales’s regions (so obviously the WRU in their infinite wisdom are looking to cull them) and they’ll fancy their chances in the upcoming festive derbies. A few wins against their Welsh rivals and the Ospreys could put themselves back in position to compete for the knockouts towards the end of the year.
14 Zebre
Zebre are very much Italy’s second club when it comes to funding and that’s reflected in their results throughout their time in the URC. They are still struggling to climb off the bottom rungs of the table, but they’re no longer an easy fixture. They started the season strong, with two straight home victories. Although their schedule toughened since then and they’ve now lost three straight. They face a Cardiff side in round 6 that will be heavily depleted as their top players will be at the Principality facing the Springboks instead of Parma. This is a must win game for Zebre as their opportunities to claim victories this season will be few and far between.
15 Scarlets
After finishing last season so strong, making the top 8 and with the excitement of having almost all the best young backs in Wales, the hopes were that they would win at least a couple of their opening 4 games. Instead they remain winless and look more like the disappointing Scarlets side of 2 seasons ago than the one that surprised many of us last year.
Their backline has not got firing yet this season, and they really rely on that unit to produce a spark for them. The pack has not been a strength of this side for a while but if they can get parity up front then they can stand a chance. Sadly they’ve not been achieving that so far. That being said, they have a few derbies coming up in December and nothing gets the physicality going like derby fixtures. The good news is the season is still young and they have time to turn things around, but they better do so quickly if they want to be in the fight for the knockouts.
16 Dragons
Ah the Dragons… every year it’s the same, changes are made, squad is supposedly stronger, then they hit the field and just simply can’t win. At some point you just stop believing the hope and accept this is a losing club. However, I do actually believe they are doing things behind the scenes to set this club up for success in the future. Perhaps their definition of success may not quite stack up with what Munster, for example, would call success. But at least it should be progress.
That’s a long term project though, and one that is fighting an uphill battle amongst the backdrop of all Welsh rugby’s turmoil. As for this season though, they are once more the weakest of the URC’s 16 teams. I really hope they can will themselves to some wins this season, and I believe they will. In Tinus de Beer and Angus O’Brien they have a couple of gamers that will give their everything to get their side over the line. If they can get some of their summer signings firing and start to see the best of their star players like Rio Dyer and Aaron Wainwright, then there’s a chance this team could start taking some scalps.