New backing for merging league and union raises the intriguing possibility of a slick, streamlined hybrid greater than the sum of its parts, writes Peter Gearin.

It's a packed stadium on a glittering Saturday night at Homebush, sometime in the future. A-listers brush past boys with painted faces and coloured scarves to find their places among butchers, teachers and plumbers. Television viewers from Moscow to Melbourne move to the edge of their seats.

On the field, the warriors line up for the anthems, first New Zealand then Australia. Then comes the haka - 12 fearsome Kiwis facing down 12 determined Australians - as the hype for the most anticipated match in rugby history hits hyperdrive. This is "ultimate rugby" - the contest between Australia's finest oval-ball players and the all-new All Blacks - a reconciliation between the rugby union and league factions that split in 1908. Now they have come together under a new set of rules that merge the best of each code to create a game that can be marketed to the world.

Science fiction? Perhaps, but last week two former national team coaches - union's Alex Evans and league's Wayne Bennett - brought a unified rugby code closer to reality when they announced they were behind a proposal to create a hybrid game. That plan aims to introduce schoolchildren to the basics of both sports with a view to create a hybrid contest. Officials from both codes reportedly gave the idea "tentative backing".

The intriguing proposal has again raised the spectre that the best hope for either code to survive in this global age is to merge; to take the best aspects of each game and sell this new brand of rugby to the world. Some believe that league, honed over a century of professionalism, has become the better game, but it struggles for traction outside a handful of countries - Australia, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea and pockets of Britain and France. Union has a legitimate international schedule, a proper World Cup every four years, multinational sponsors and a massive global audience, but is weighed down by nationalistic jealousies, negative attitudes and a hefty rulebook.

Broncos coach Bennett was enthusiastic about the idea of a hybrid-rules game after Evans raised it three years ago. "It's Alex's idea but I support it," Bennett was reported as saying. "You've got a lot of similarities between the two codes. At school level, we should look at introducing a hybrid game that would give kids the opportunity to make choices about what code they want to play."

But what if the new game is a success? What if it becomes the preferred form of rugby for players, parents and teachers? What if the new game encourages kids to continue playing because it offers more opportunities than league and more excitement than union?

Queensland Rugby Union chairman Peter Lewis said during the week that a hybrid game might end up bringing the two codes together for good. "I've always said the smartest thing rugby could do is merge with rugby league," he said.

"League is big in Australia but it's going nowhere in the rest of the world, whereas the biggest advantage rugby has is that it's an international game.

"We get hung-up on tradition but we've got to be more lateral in our thinking."

How could it happen? One insider told The Sun-Herald that merger talks between league and union were briefly contemplated when Super League threatened to rip the game apart in the mid-1990s. There have also been calls to play matches between the codes, with the first half played under union rules and the second under league rules. In his book It's Only a Game, Australian Rugby Union boss John O'Neill told of the time he spoke to Channel Nine boss and league benefactor Kerry Packer for several hours about creating a league/union hybrid. O'Neill wrote that Packer sketched out his plans on butcher's paper, even proposing to make the field smaller to encourage more tries. Packer was said to favour keeping union's lineout and scrums but said rucks and mauls were "a dog's breakfast".

Ultimately, though, Packer didn't want to risk losing league's heartland. "Son, we're appealing to two different markets," Packer told O'Neill. "And the power of rugby league's penetration into the western suburbs of Sydney is something I'd never give up or risk."

Perhaps the games are moving closer together anyway. South African winger Bryan Habana said the so-called experimental rules being used for the first time in the Super 14 gave union "a lot more rugby league feel" to it. And many quality players have been able to move freely between the codes. Think Timana Tahu and Mat Rogers in Australia, Brad Thorn in New Zealand, and Andy Farrell and Jason Robinson in England. There's also no doubt that the world's elite would thrive in either code. Darren Lockyer, Johnathan Thurston, Richie McCaw and Dan Carter would be superstars in any game that rewards speed, skill and courage. Another barrier that existed for decades between the codes - the professional-amateur divide - is gone. Twenty years ago it would have been fanciful to think the best-paid rugby player in the country would play union. Stand up, Matt Giteau.

So how would the new game look? It would need to encourage keeping the ball in hand and sweeping backline movements but reward good defence. Scoring tries, though difficult, would be the aim of the game, not an afterthought as it often appears in union. Tries would be worth more than they are in league; drop goals worth less than they are in union.

Perhaps there would be fewer players - say, 12 - with no breakaways but four interchange players. The game would be played on a conventional rugby field, giving outside players more room to exploit.

Five forwards in the scrum would ensure a contest at that set-piece and give hookers a legitimate role. Lineouts would be used any time the ball goes out, and this would be a highlight of the new game.

Perhaps rucks and mauls would be abandoned in favour of controlled touch football-style "dumps", with the ball having to be cleared immediately from dummy-half. Ball movement would be encouraged in the six plays each team has in attack. The defence would be forced to retreat five metres on every play.

Referees would be given a skinny rule book, encouraged to play advantage and told to keep the whistle out of their mouths. At the elite level, coaches would get three video challenges per half, with each unsuccessful challenge giving them one less interchange.

A hybrid game has always had a stronger chance of success in the Antipodes than in the northern hemisphere. Both codes have solid support in their communities in Australia and face common enemies in Aussie rules and football. While the All Blacks remain the equivalent of a religious icon in New Zealand, league has solid support. The NZRL says it has 22,000 registered players and 11,000 juniors on its books.

But there would be enormous resistance to change. In 2001, Parramatta boss Denis Fitzgerald was attacked by parties on both sides of the rugby fence when he suggested the two codes could join forces.

"I just think this talk about the two games getting together is laughable," Eddie Jones was quoted as saying. "It's just nonsense. No one has called for baseball and cricket to get together. No one says AFL and Gaelic football should merge. They are two different games, and so are rugby league and rugby union.

"Those people who envisage a hybrid game don't understand that rugby union is an international sport. The people who talk about it are looking only into their own backyard and thinking that that is the rest of the world. It's not."

The then Broncos chief executive Shane Edwards agreed: "From my point of view, I don't think the codes will ever come together."

There are many reasons for that view. A century of shared hatred is just one of the stumbling blocks. It would also be difficult to see the northern hemisphere rugby unions jumping at the chance to mix it with the "mungos". It's a bad sign that rugby officialdom and the media in England viewed last year's woeful World Cup as a triumph for the game.

Perhaps it won't happen overnight, but it should happen.

>HOW IT MAY WORK

- Twelve players a team - no breakaways

- Four interchange players

- Five forwards only

- Contested scrums

- Lineouts when the ball goes out

- Rucks and mauls abandoned

- Introduce controlled touch football-style "dumps"

- Ball to clear dummy-half immediately

- Keeping the ball in hand and sweeping backline movements to be encouraged

- Maximum of six plays in attack

- Defence to retreat five metres on every play

- Scoring tries to be the aim of the game

- Tries would be worth more than they are in league; drop goals worth less than they are in union