CPUT, Wits and WSU will form part of the 12 university teams that will compete the Varsity Sevens at Greenside this Friday and Saturday.

The tournament will take on a pool format, instead of the round-robin format of previous years. The 12 teams have been split into three pools with four in each. The top two teams per pool and next best two teams qualify for the quarter-finals.

Varsity Sevens manager Xhanti-Lomzi Nesi explained that the change in format was to create an improved product for spectators.

‘The reason we wanted to take Varsity Sevens from the full round robin format to pool stage, was that it was in the best commercial interest of the business and of our sponsors. We found that we lost a lot of consumers through a three-day tournament.

‘The market became oversaturated with people watching sevens from early in the morning to late in the afternoons, and over three days. We believed it would be able to captivate the audience and the crowd if we played it over two days.

‘It also allows the teams to play in a more traditional sevens set up as they do in other sevens tournaments, such as USSA where they qualify for the Varsity Sevens.’

Varsity Sevens pools:

Pool A: UWC, CPUT, Madibaz, WSU-All Blacks
Pool B: UJ, UP-Tuks, UCT, Wits
Pool C: NWU, Maties, Kovsies, UKZN

Photo: Luke Thorrold/Varsity Cup