WATCH: World Rugby breaks down the proposed Nations Championship format

The governing body behind rugby union around the world, World Rugby, has finally broken down the format of the proposed Nations Championship into digestible bits of information.

The 12 nations that will take part in the proposed tournament feature the usual European Six Nations Championship (the northern hemisphere’s premier international rugby competition) countries, plus the four countries that take part in the Rugby Championship (the southern hemisphere’s premier international rugby competition), and a further two qualifying nations, as determined by the World Rugby rankings.

The usual Six Nations matches will be played in their usual slots on the calendar with the Rugby Championship games also keeping their slots on the calendar. The Six Nations teams will play the Rugby Championship sides in two rounds – one before the Rugby Championship and one after – with the winners of each conference playing in a grand finale to determine the overall winner.

Each nation will play all the others once, which means that every country will play a total of 11 games. The proposed tournament will be played on an annual basis, except in years in which a Rugby World Cup is played. While the proposition has been met with a lot of public criticism, rugby union’s major stakeholders have had largely positive meetings regarding the tournament.

For more in-depth details regarding the relegation to and promotion from the lower structures, as well as heaps of other info, you can World Rugby’s video here:

https://www.facebook.com/worldrugby/videos/374154683138717/