MLR 2021 Schedule – What to Expect

Major League Rugby will unveil its full schedule for 2021 season – its fourth – on Tuesday, December 8. As previously confirmed the season kicks off on March 20 with the Championship Final slated for August 1. Americas Rugby News has acquired a final draft copy of the 2021 schedule and while we won’t publish in its entirety, below we share some of the talking points that will emerge with its release.

1. New Venues

MLR will make its debut at four new venues in 2021. Old Glory DC will move from Cardinal Stadium at Catholic University to Segra Field in Leesburg. The new location won’t excite fans located in DC proper but it’s a significant upgrade in facilities. The creation of a supporters bus to take fans back and forth might be a good idea here. Of course if fans aren’t allowed to attend… let’s just stay hopeful on that front.

A similar move but less extreme could see the Toronto Arrows playing their home games at the refreshed York Lions Stadium. The King Street location of Lamport Stadium was superior but the facility has been under a bubble since the pandemic began and is now the site of a large homeless encampment. It’s unlikely to be in operational condition any time soon.

The Arrows have previously played games at Alumni Field at York University but with renovations at the main stadium set to be completed in early 2021, a move across the street is enticing. There awaits a shiny new 5th-generation full-size World Rugby-certified turf field. In terms of amenities there is no comparison to the archaic Lamport and though less convenient for downtown dwellers, there is at least direct access to the subway line within walking distance.

Of course there are two new teams, each of whom have opted for colossal venues to start. With Reverchon Park’s redevelopment on hold, the Dallas Jackals will play at the retrofitted Globe Life Park in Arlington, the former home of the Texas Rangers. Ordinarily that would be the largest venue by far, but these are not ordinary times.

The LA Giltinis teased an enormous stadium with their introductory press release, and they are sticking to the plan. LA will play their home games at the Memorial Coliseum, home of the USC Trojans football team. Its 77,500 capacity is greater than the rest of the MLR venues (minus Dallas) combined.

2. Hasta Luego Las Vegas 

The experiment of sending eight teams to Las Vegas for a wild weekend in the desert last season can only be described as a flop. Attendance was poor, the dated facility universally panned by players, and five of the teams involved were forced to give up a home game. As it happened the pandemic made that bit a moot point. In any event the league will not be returning in 2021.

3. Weekend Warriors

While dates and kickoff times are always subject to change, the 2021 schedule is decidedly aimed at Saturday and Sunday games. There is only one Friday night fixture on the schedule, along with two Thursday games late in the season and even one Monday match. Opening weekend will have five of the six games on Saturday, and there is one weekend in May that has all six games on the same day. Four of the 18 rounds will feature five games, the rest six.

4. Clashing Kickoff Times

This is an inevitability as the league expands, but it is still frustrating to see overlapping kickoff times with a maximum six games to schedule over a weekend. By effectively cutting that down to two days, this problem is exacerbated in 2021. As things stand all five games on opening day will start within 90 minutes of each other, with three featuring identical kickoff times. As above this is subject to change but the schedule we have has only two weekends where games don’t clash.

5. A Balanced Home/Away Schedule

This coming season will feature MLR’s most balanced schedule to date in terms of home/away dates. In 2019 we saw enormous swings with Austin opening with 5 home games and closing with 7 away games. RUNY had a 5-game road trip and a 4-game homestand. Toronto were famously the total extreme – the first half on the road, the second half entirely at home.

The 2020 schedule was an improvement on that but there were still severe imbalances. The Arrows would have started with 7 games away (the Vegas game technically a home fixture) and Seattle were set to play a sequence of 5 home games in 6 weeks in the middle the season.

In 2021 much of that has been solved. No team will play more than 2 home games in a row, and only two teams will travel for more than 2 weeks at a time. One opens the season with a 3-week road trip, another will spend the first 5 weeks on the road – the latter is a surprise and not due to climate.

6. Reduced Travel

Divisional play takes center stage this season. Each team will play 16 games across the 18 week regular season. That makes for some tricky scheduling with the imbalance between the seven Western Conference teams and the six in the East. All teams will play home-and-away against the rest of their division. The east teams will play one extra ‘derby’ game against their closest divisional rival. Of course the math doesn’t quite add up and means that…

7. Some Match-Ups Will Not Happen in 2021

…no team will face every possible opponent in MLR in 2021. Those in the West will play four Eastern Conference opponents. Meanwhile four teams in the East will face five Western Conference opponents, with two teams getting a second extra ‘derby’ match against an Eastern rival. To be clear, two of the six East teams will play two East opponents three times. This is all to say that fans of two teams hoping to have a crack at the Mighty Martinis, er… Giltinis, may have to wait until 2022.