The 2025 men’s Rugby Africa 7s tournament is exactly twenty-five days away. It will be played at the Labourdonnais Sport Club in Mauritius from June 21-22.
The tournament will feature twelve African countries, including Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, Kenya, Madagascar, Mauritius, Nigeria, South Africa, Tunisia, Senegal, Zambia, Zimbabwe, and defending champions Uganda.
Unlike the previous edition which was two rounds, this year’s edition will be played over only one round as international rugby sevens faces a bleak future.
This is because on May 1, 2025, World Rugby unveiled a new SVNS Series format which saw the core teams and number of events trimmed further.
What does the new World Rugby SVNS Series format look like?
From the 2025-26 season, the World Rugby SVNS Series, for both men’s and women’s competitions, has been split into three divisions.
Division 3 will be a single stand-alone tournament featuring eight teams qualified from the regional tournaments (like the Rugby Africa 7s in which both Uganda’s men’s and women’s national teams participate). This division replaces the multiple-round Challenger Series. The top two teams will progress to the next division.
Division 2 will be three rounds featuring six teams. The composition of these are the bottom four ranked teams from the 2024-25 series and the two promoted from Division 3.
Division 1 is the original and familiar top tier World Rugby SVNS Series. It will be six rounds featuring eight teams.
When these three divisions have completed their respective tournaments, the top four from Division 2 will join the teams in Division 1 for the SVNS World Championship.
This world championship, set up in the Olympic Games format, will be played over three rounds to determine the winner of the season.
What does the new format mean for Uganda?
World Rugby Media and officials say the new format is an opportunity for teams outside the series like Uganda to qualify for the top tier within just one season.
But there is a catch.
First, the new format has added an extra step in the qualification pathway to the top tier World Rugby SVNS Series.
Initially, winning the qualifier tournament (in Hong Kong) or the Challenger Series would earn one a ticket to the series. A final qualification tournament was introduced in 2023-24 but from 2025-26, a team will need to go through three steps to reach the top level Championship.
Second, the number of tournaments available to play for those teams outside the series has reduced.
From 2023-24, there were three Challenger Series rounds per season for them to take part in. But starting with 2025-26, it will be just one tournament; the stand-alone Division 3— which is the same as the Challenger Series but one level lower.
This means that those teams will need to compete against teams who have played more games against more opponents within the same season.
It does not require rocket science for one to figure that realising the World Rugby SVNS (7s) Series dream has been made even more difficult for countries like Uganda.
So what happens to the national 7s program?
Although the door to international rugby 7s has been slammed shut in the face of Uganda and similar developing countries, killing their 7s programs is not the best way forward.
Compared to test rugby, playing rugby 7s is, for now, still the most sustainable way to develop talent with access to world class international competition. Rugby 7s also remains the quickest and easiest way for countries like Uganda to reach the top tier of international rugby.
But unfortunately, the priorities of the men’s and women’s national 7s programs and resource allocation towards them will take a hit.
