The 2026 Nationwide Rugby 7s Sequence will start with loads at stake after the Stone Metropolis 7s swimming pools have been unveiled forward of the season opener in Jinja.
This 12 months’s competitors introduces a brand new format that’s anticipated to make each match rely.
The boys’s area has been decreased to 12 core groups cut up into three swimming pools of 4, whereas the ladies’s competitors has expanded to eight groups in two teams.
The collection shall be performed over six rounds throughout the nation earlier than concluding with the Kakaba Coronation 7s at Muteesa II Stadium in Wakulukuku.
The boys’s draw has already produced a standout group. Pool B pits final season’s runners-up Heathens towards a resurgent KOBs, Mongers and Mbale Elephants in what guarantees to be the hardest battle of the opening spherical.
Hosts Walukuba Barbarians headline Pool A alongside Rhinos, Hippos and Victoria Sharks, whereas Pool C options Buffaloes, Black Pirates, Eagles and Rams.
The ladies’s competitors is equally aggressive. Defending champions Thunderbirds have been drawn with Walukuba Titans, final season’s shock bundle, in addition to an bettering Nile Rapids and Mbale Eagles in Pool A.
Pool B consists of Avengers, Black Pearls, She Wolves and Ewes.
The brand new format raises the stakes within the group stage. The highest two groups from every males’s pool will qualify robotically for the quarterfinals, with the remaining two locations going to the very best third-placed groups based mostly on factors earned in the course of the pool stage.
If groups end stage on factors, rankings shall be determined by factors distinction, adopted by strive distinction, whole factors scored, whole tries scored and, if essential, a coin toss.
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