Today's rugby news as new 'Club World Cup' agreed in seismic move and Nigel Owens says Wayne Barnes got it wrong

Here are the latest rugby headlines on Thursday, July 21.

The blueprint for a new rugby "Club World Cup" has been agreed in a move that will shake up the elite game and see "the best club team in the world" crowned once every four years.

The Telegraph report the new tournament is scheduled to start in 2025, pitting the top 16 sides in the northern and southern hemispheres against each other. Eight teams from the northern hemisphere will be included, with these set to be the ones which qualify for the European Champions Cup quarter-finals.

Seven sides from the southern hemisphere's Super Rugby competition, plus one from Japan, will join them, with those sides being placed in four pools and playing two matches against teams from the other hemisphere. The winner of each pool will then progress to the semi-finals.

The competition is proposed to take place instead of the knockout rounds of the Champions Cup and will happen once every four years ahead of a British and Irish Lions tour.

The Telegraph say the format has been endorsed by key stakeholders, including Premiership Rugby and representatives for players.

“This is going to be massive for the club game and should generate huge interest from supporters, sponsors and broadcasters in both hemispheres,” one source told the newspaper. “For the first time we are going to be able to declare which side is the best in the world."

Qualification will be purely on merit, with no national representation guaranteed, and the South African sides, who now play in the United Rugby Championship, classed as northern hemisphere teams.

Nigel Owens believes Wayne Barnes and the World Rugby independent disciplinary panel which cleared Ireland's Andrew Porter got it wrong.

Barnes sparked