Is Ultimate Sevens Planned Franchise League The Real Deal?

Ultimate Sevens is one of a handful of new proposed rugby tournaments that promise to shake up the global game, and the global 7s league aims to launch in Summer 2026. The league has cofirmed that it has now signed more than “100 top players from around the world”.

Feature Photo Credit – World Rugby SVNS

Ultimate Sevens is a new global rugby sevens league from Bia Sports Group, which plans to launch in August 2026 with seven franchises.

Following the hardly surprising news that the separate 15s rugby R360 has been shelved until 2028, but the Ultimate Sevens said its roster of signed players includes players from the 2024 Paris Olympics and leading names across the men’s and women’s game.

A huge number of players who competed at the Olympics retired from international rugby but have been playing in competitions such as the RPL and in invitational teams, such as at the Coral Coast Fiji 7s.

Ultimate Rugby said via a press release that the signed roster “marks close to 70% of the league’s full player pool and gives fans the first real look at the scale and ambition behind the competition.”

They added that athletes represent 16+ nations, and that more names will be added. Ultimate Sevens is on course to have 70% of the required player pool secured, but their original target date to have 1o0 players signed up was August 2025.

Barney Pascall, Managing Director of Ultimate Sevens said: “Ultimate Sevens is all about elevating the platform for players, fans, and the sport itself. Securing this calibre of talent so early is a huge statement of intent and shows the appetite world-class athletes have for what we’re building. We’re excited to share more in the weeks ahead as we continue to help build and shape the future of rugby sevens.”

Photo Credit – World Rugby SVNS – Dubai 2025

What Is The Ultimate Sevens?

Ultimate Sevens global franchise rugby sevens league will feature men’s and women’s teams and aims to stage seven tournaments, which they say is a “modernised format designed for modern audiences.”

These innovations are planned to be “short, high-energy matches” with bold event experiences, and a culturally relevant global brand. It is a lot of the same rhetoric that World Rugby planned and spoke of when it launched the re-imagined SVNS Series, which has had mixed success.

The tinkering of rules we have also seen in the inaugural season of the Rugby Premier League in India and at the recent Chinese National Games – is Sevens that broken that it needs innovation to the game format?

The legs for the first season have a Euro-centric focus, with plans to stage the seven rounds in London, Dublin, Paris, Amsterdam, Munich, Rome and Barcelona.

They do say that they do not want to be an adversary for the HSBC World Rugby SVNS but rather a “positive and complementary addition to the global rugby ecosystem, offering a fan-led model that places players at the heart of the experience.”

Who Are BIA Sports Group?

Tom Burwell – BSG’s Chief Executive

Bia Sports focuses on investment opportunities in emerging and established sports and was established by investors and entrepreneurs Kyril Louis-Dreyfus and Juan Sartori. BIA Sports Group are the investor behind Sunderland AFC, who assumed full control of the Black Cats in 2023.

The pair also own the World Supercross Championship, which is run by Tom Burwell, who is the BSG’s chief executive and who used to be the former executive director of Emirates Dubai 7s.

Burwell prevously said, “Rugby invented a short form version of its game before other sports did. But the irony is it takes longer than the full version of the sport to complete, and that is a problem. We need to create something that will bring fans back into consuming the sport with the best athletes in the world participating, and it needs to get back to its short version of two to four hours.”

He also said in previous interviews that they will need 164 players for the 7s franchise league and that the players involved will see financial benefits, allowing them to be full-time professional rugby sevens players.

The first season of the 2025 Rugby Premier League was held from 15 to 29 June, so an August 2026 launch date would see any active players on the HSBC SVNS Series play from December – June 2026 for their nations, then straight into RPL if ot goes ahead around the same time, and then straight into the Ultimate Sevens! 

Sevens Rugby News

• Cape Town SVNS 2025 – Pools and Teams.
• Savannah Bodman – Take Your Opportunities.
• 2026 HSBC SVNS Series Dates and Venues Confirmed
• Sakura Mizutani – On Levelling Up as a Professional Player.
• New York To Host 2026 US Leg of HSBC SVNS.