Dubai: Asia Rugby on Monday unveiled plans for September’s inaugural Asia Rugby Western Clubs Champions League.
Four championship-winning clubs from the most recent respective cross-border or domestic competitions in the UAE, GCC, Sri Lanka and Kazakhstan — Abu Dhabi Saracens, Doha, Kandy and Olymp — will play against each other in order to decide the champions of West Asia.
Doha will face Saracens in Qatar on September 11, Kandy will play Olymp in Dubai on September 12 and Saracens will then play Kandy in Abu Dhabi and Doha will play Olymp in Qatar on September 15 before Saracens face Olymp and Kandy play Doha, both in Dubai on September 18.
Asia Rugby president Trevor Gregory said: “I am delighted that we have been able to bring about the inaugural Asia Rugby Western Clubs Champions League.
“This initiative has been brought about by the commitment of our member unions in Sri Lanka, Kazakhstan, the UAE and Qatar, which have quality cross-border or domestic men’s 15s club competitions.
“I am also extremely grateful to the four clubs for committing to this project in its first year, not least financially. Asia Rugby sees this new, annual competition as the bridge between senior domestic and international representative rugby and hopes that it will provide further incentive for all clubs in the region to win their respective competitions each year, to have the chance to compete for this prestigious new title.
“Asia Rugby also hopes that this will provide a new opportunity for clubs to further engage new players, supporters, volunteers and sponsors, as well as providing new opportunities for Asia’s match officials.
“Over the coming years, Asia Rugby hopes to develop this competition further to embrace more clubs and be replicated by an equivalent competition in the eastern half of Asia, ultimately so that we can have a play-off between the western and eastern winners for the right to call themselves Asia Rugby Club Champions [outside of the Japanese top league].”
