World Rugby has introduced a new international sevens competition for both men and women, World Rugby Sevens Challenger Series, that will be launched in February 2020.
The new series will feature 13 core teams, top-ranked from the 6 World Rugby regions alongside 3 invitational teams. These 16 teams will play two rounds after which the top 8 core teams will compete in one final playoff tournament for a spot in the HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series. The winner of that tournament will be promoted to replace the bottom-placed cored team in the HSBC Sevens Series in the immediate following season.
Having won silver at the 2019 Rugby Africa Men’s Sevens in Johannesburg, South Africa on November 8-9, 2019, Uganda thus qualifies for the inaugural 2020 World Rugby Challenger Series as a core side from the African continent.
Uganda will compete with fellow African nation Zimbabwe and others that include Brazil, Chile, Germany, Hong Kong, Italy, Jamaica, Japan, Papua New Guinea, Portugal, Tonga and Uruguay. Colombia, Mexico and Paraguay complete the list as the three invitational teams from the Americas.
The two rounds of the inaugural World Rugby Sevens Challenger Series will be played in South America in Viña del Mar, Chile on the dates of February 15-16, 2020 and Montevideo, Uruguay on February 22-23, 2020.
The final play-off tournament for promotion to the HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series will be hosted in Hong Kong on 3-5 April, 2020 alongside the Hong Kong event of the Sevens Series.
The News Editor ,Reporter at Kagadi Kibaale community Radio
