Monaco Rugby Sevens begins a new era this month as France’s professional sevens rugby championship, the In Extenso Supersevens, adopts its biggest structural overhaul since launching in 2020, with the club’s Top 14 rivals and invited teams set to compete under a significantly reshaped format from this season onward.
Rather than the three summer stages used in previous editions, the competition has been trimmed to two qualifying summer legs before a standalone final, a change the Ligue Nationale de Rugby says is designed to sharpen the intensity of each event and boost its media visibility. Each summer stage will now unfold across two full days rather than one, opening with pool-stage matches on the Friday, followed by an evening night session designed to build atmosphere, before Saturday is given over entirely to knockout rugby through to the finals.
This year’s two summer legs take place in Biarritz on August 21 and 22, followed by Pau on August 28 and 29, before the season concludes with the grand final at Paris La Défense Arena on February 6 and 7, 2027.
Alongside the format change, this edition marks the first time the men’s and women’s competitions will run with full parity, competing in an identical format at every stage of the season, rather than the partial structure used in the previous two editions, where women’s matches featured at only two of four stages. The move reflects a broader push from the LNR and title partner In Extenso, who has renewed its naming partnership with the league for a further five seasons through 2030-31, to grow the profile of women’s sevens rugby in France.
For Monaco Rugby Sevens, backed as Honorary President by Prince Albert II and built around a broader ambition to represent the Principality on the international sevens stage, the new format offers a sharper, more concentrated route through the French season, with fewer but higher-stakes stages ahead of February’s championship decider in Paris.