User:Ham105/sandbox/p1

Teams and players
The league will begin play in 2016 with five or six U.S. based teams. The competition plans to expand in 2017, and is expected to include Canadian teams.

Each team has a roster limit of 30 players. Each team may field up to five foreign players. All player contracts will be held by the league, and not by the individual teams. Players will earn salaries on average of around $25,000, with national team players making closer to $40,000.

The competition will operate as a single-entity structure. All teams, at least initially, will be owned by the league itself; individual investors will own an interest in the competition, but will not own individual teams.

Teams and players
The league will begin play in 2016 with five or six U.S. based teams. The competition plans to expand in 2017, and is expected to include Canadian teams.

Each team has a roster limit of 30 players. Each team may field up to five foreign players. All player contracts will be held by the league, and not by the individual teams. Players will earn salaries on average of around $25,000, with national team players making closer to $40,000.

The competition will operate as a single-entity structure. All teams, at least initially, will be owned by the league itself; individual investors will own an interest in the competition, but will not own individual teams.

Broadcast
PRO Rugby matches will be available for live online streaming. The competition does not currently have a TV broadcast contract.

Previous attempts
For several years prior to PRO Rugby's planned launch in 2016, a number of entities had explored launching a professional competition for fifteen-a-side rugby. The Rugby Super League, a national competition that began play in 1997, was discussed as potentially moving towards becoming a professional competition, but the 2008 recession damaged the RSL and several teams exited the competition from 2009 to 2012, before the league folded following the 2012 season.

In 2012, the American Professional Rugby Competition was reported to be exploring a launch of a ten-team league for 2015, but nothing came of it.

The National Rugby Football League also announced its intention to begin a professional rugby competition, and scheduled the Independence Cup, but the venture never got off the ground.

PRO Rugby
In early November 2015, PRO Rugby launched its Facebook page and scheduled an announcement for November 9, 2015.

On November 9, 2015, PRO Rugby made an official announcement outlining its plans and a framework for the competition. USA Rugby affirmed that it sanctioned and supported the PRO Rugby competition. PRO Rugby announced its first team, Sacramento, on November 18, 2015. PRO Rugby announced its second team, San Francisco, on November 19, 2015.

Teams were scheduled to have coaches by the end of 2015. However, the uncertainty caused by the open position for Head Coach of the U.S. national rugby team led to PRO Rugby announcements being put on hold. As of mid-January 2016, with the U.S. head coach in place but no further developments from Pro Rugby, the league then offered the explanation that negotiating venues was what was holding up coach and player announcements, and that three venues were close to agreement. On January 22, 2016, PRO Rugby announced San Diego as the league's third team, and media sources started speculating that the league may have only five teams in 2016 instead of the planned six teams.

Chart
<!-- The Canberra Vikings or University of Canberra Vikings, (formerly known as the Canberra Kookaburras) is an Australian rugby union team that competes in the National Rugby Championship (NRC). The team is based at Viking Park in Wanniassa, and is backed by a three-way partnership between the Tuggeranong Vikings Group, the ACT Brumbies and the University of Canberra.

The University of Canberra Vikings team in the NRC takes its identity from the Canberra Vikings side that played in the previous national competition, the Australian Rugby Championship (ARC). The ARC was discontinued following the first season in 2007, but after an absence of six years the national competition was relaunched as the NRC in 2014.

The high performance programs utilised by the Brumbies for Super Rugby are extended to players joining the team from the Brumbies, the ACTRU Premier Division competition, and junior players from the ACT and Southern NSW Rugby Union catchment area.

History
In 1989 the then Canberra Kookaburras defeated Fiji's national side 34-9 at Seiffert Oval. The Canberra Vikings represented Canberra in the Tooheys New Cup and Queensland Premier Rugby championships and won three consecutive titles; 2001, 2002 and 2003 in the Queensland Premier Rugby competition. They competed in the only Australian Rugby Championship in 2007 where they failed to progress out of the robin-round stages, with only three from eight wins; 17–8 win over Perth Spirit, 53–8 win over Ballymore Tornadoes and a 56–29 win over Sydney Fleet.

Revival
In 2014 it was announced that the Canberra Vikings team, named as University of Canberra Vikings, would represent the ACT and Southern NSW Rugby Union, Brumbies, University of Canberra and Tuggeranong Vikings in the National Rugby Championship. They would be coached by Dan McKellar and will play at Viking Park. Fotu Auelua was named as captain of the Vikings for the 2014 season, with Jarrad Butler and Robbie Coleman as vice-captains along with Jesse Mogg and Tim Cree in a five-player leadership group.

Colours and logo
The Name and Logo of the Canberra Vikings have been used since foundation for the Tooheys New Cup and their traditional colors of Black, Red and White will be used again for the Australian Rugby Championship.

Stadium
The Canberra Vikings played out of two locations for their 4 home games in the Australian Rugby Championship; Manuka Oval and Canberra Stadium. Manuka Oval was constructed in 1929 and hosts the annual Prime Ministers XI cricket match, as well as senior club AFL and cricket. Originally Manuka Oval was not just a cricket ground, but was also used for International rugby matches, mainly between a Canberra Invitational XI and the touring international side. Canberra Stadium (originally Bruce Stadium) was constructed in 1977 and is the home of the ACT Brumbies and Canberra Raiders. For their revival in 2014, they will play at Viking Park which has seen multiple rugby union matches played at the stadium including two Australia women's matches against New Zealand women's.

Record

 * {| class="wikitable"

! style="width:20px;"|Year ! style="width:20px;"|Pos ! style="width:20px;"|Pld ! style="width:20px;"|W ! style="width:20px;"|D ! style="width:20px;"|L ! style="width:20px;"|F ! style="width:20px;"|A ! style="width:25px;"|+/- ! style="width:20px;"|BP ! style="width:20px;"|Pts ! style="width:170px;"|Play-offs
 * - border=1 cellpadding=5 cellspacing=0
 * - align=center
 * align=left|2007
 * align=left|6th
 * 8 || 3 || 0 || 5 || 217 || 191 || 26 || 7 || 19 ||Did Not Compete
 * }

Franchise area
The teams franchise area covered the Canberra Premier Rugby Competition. This included all clubs & players in the Canberra Premier Rugby Competition.

2007 squad

 * {| class="collapsible collapsed" style=" width: 80%; margin: 0px; border: 1px solid darkgray; border-spacing: 3px;"

! colspan="10" style="background-color:#f2f2f2; cell-border:2px solid black; padding-left: 1em; padding-right: 1em; text-align: center;" |2007 Canberra Vikings – ARC Props
 * style="width: 25px;" |
 * style="font-size: 95%;" valign="top"|
 * style="font-size: 95%;" valign="top"|
 * Nic Henderson
 * Jack Kennedy
 * Pauliasi Tomoepeau
 * John Ulugia

Hookers
 * Saia Faingaa
 * Anthony Hegarty
 * Dan Raymond

Locks
 * Alister Campbell
 * Peter Kimlin
 * Leon Power
 * Adam Wallace-Harrison

Back row
 * style="width: 25px;" |
 * style="font-size: 95%;" valign="top"|
 * Jarred Barry
 * Mark Chisholm
 * Dan Guinness
 * Julian Salvi
 * Jone Tawake
 * Henry Vanderglas

Halfbacks
 * Beau Mokotupu
 * Nick Haydon
 * Patrick Phibbs

Flyhalves
 * Christian Lealiifano

Centres
 * style="width: 25px;" |
 * style="font-size: 95%;" valign="top"|
 * Tim Cornforth
 * Matthew Carraro
 * Anthony Faingaa
 * Gene Fairbanks
 * Rowan Kellam

Wings
 * Francis Fainifo
 * Solomona Fainifo
 * Eddie Mclaughlin

Fullbacks
 * Tim Wright
 * }

Current squad
The squad for the 2014 National Rugby Championship season:

Denotes team captain, Denotes that a player is unavailable due to injury, Bold denotes player is internationally capped.

Australian national players allocation
On 21 July 2014, the Australian Rugby Union unveiled the recognised Australian national players, players who were in the 32-man squad for the June Test series against France. The players are as follows:
 * Sam Carter
 * Christian Lealiifano
 * Pat McCabe
 * Scott Sio

Former coaches

 * Dan McKellar (2014–)
 * Nick Scrivener and Tom Morrison (2007)

Honours

 * Shute Shield
 * Runners Up: 1995


 * Queensland Premier Rugby
 * Winners: 2001, 2002, 2003