2013 Super Rugby season


The 2013 Super Rugby season was the third season of the new 15-team format for the Super Rugby competition involving teams from Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. The tournament was won by the Chiefs, who defeated the Canberra-based Brumbies 27–22 in the competition final. For sponsorship reasons, this competition is known as FxPro Super Rugby in Australia, Investec Super Rugby in New Zealand and Vodacom Super Rugby in South Africa. Including the past incarnations as Super 12 and Super 14, this was the 18th season of the Southern Hemisphere's premier domestic competition. Conference matches took place every weekend from 15 February until 13 July – with a break between rounds 17 and 18 for internationals games – followed by the play-offs series that culminated in the final on 3 August.
The 2013 season saw the Southern Kings of South Africa enter the competition for the first time, having replaced the under-performing Lions. The Kings achieved three victories in their inaugural tournament, but finished last following the regular season, and were defeated by the Lions in a two-leg play-off for a position in the South African conference for the 2014 season.
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Competition format

Covering 25 weeks, the schedule featured a total of 125 matches. The 15 teams were grouped by country, labelled the Australian Conference, New Zealand Conference and the South African Conference. The regular season consisted of two types of matches:Internal Conference Matches – Each team played the other four teams in the same conference twice, home and away.Cross Conference Matches – Each team played four teams of the other two conferences away, and four teams of the other two conferences home, thus missing out on two teams. Each team played two home and two away games against teams from each of the other countries, making a total of eight cross conference games for each team.
The top team of each conference, plus the next top three teams in table points regardless of conference, moved on to the finals. The top two conference winners, based on table points, received first-round byes. In the first round of the finals, the third conference winner was the #3 seed and hosted the wild card team with the worst record, and the best wild card team hosted the second-best wild card team. In the semi-finals, the #2 conference winner hosted the higher surviving seed from the first round, and the #1 conference winner hosted the other first-round winner. The final is hosted by the top remaining seed.
In addition, a two-legged promotion/relegation play-off took place at the end of the season between the bottom team in the South African Conference and the Lions, with the winner qualifying for Super Rugby in 2014.

Standings

PosTeamRndWDLByePFPAPDTFTATBLBPts
1Brumbies1810242430295+13543315360
2Reds1810242321296+2531234258
3Waratahs188082411371+4045341445
4Rebels1850112382515−13344654537
5Force1841112267366−9926340531

PosTeamRndWDLByePFPAPDTFTATBLBPts
1Chiefs1812042458364+9450388266
2Crusaders1811052446307+13944315360
3Blues1860102347364−1740366644
4Hurricanes1860102386457−7141494541
5Highlanders1830132374496−12240554529

PosTeamRndWDLByePFPAPDTFTATBLBPts
1Bulls1812042448330+11841345263
2Cheetahs1810062382358+2438322454
3Stormers189072346292+5430181550
4Sharks188082384305+7940313548
5Southern Kings1831122298564−26627692024

PosTeamRndWDLByePFPAPDTFTATBLBPts
1

Regular season

Round 8

Round 16

Promotion/relegation play-offs

The Promotion/Relegation series is not an official part of the Super Rugby competition as organised by SANZAR. Instead, it was introduced by SARU to give the sixth South African franchise an opportunity to qualify for Super Rugby.

Results

Players

Leading try scorers

Source: South African Rugby Union

Leading point scorers

PosNameTeamPoints
1Morné SteynBulls248
2Christian LealiifanoBrumbies233
3Beauden BarrettHurricanes186
4Quade CooperReds172
5Patrick LambieSharks171
6Dan CarterCrusaders170
6Joe PietersenStormers170
8Gareth AnscombeChiefs166
9Demetri CatrakilisSouthern Kings142
10Brendan McKibbinWaratahs139

Source: South African Rugby Union

Referees

The following refereeing panel was appointed by SANZAR for the 2013 Super Rugby season: