Most notably, the originally proposed two-pool structure for the second half of the season was not established and, as a result, the competition will remain with home-and-away fixtures where possible, however, not all teams will play each other twice.

On top of that, three clubs - Orange Emus, CSU Bathurst and Parkes Boars - will only have one bye, on top of the two regular general byes, compared to the remaining clubs’ two, and will also play one extra game because of that.

Upon the request of the Blowes Clothing Cup clubs, the two local derby rounds were also maintained, in rounds seven and 19.

“The two-pool system was never accepted by all the Blowes Clothing Cup clubs, so that’s why we went away from it,” CWRU chief executive officer Peter Veenstra said.

“We [scheduled] rounds one to six, and then eight to 11. For the second round of games, we added the local derby in round 19, and then [scheduled] the remaining rounds. Not all of the clubs get to play each other twice, but that is the fairest way we could do it because we were limited by [available weeks for the regular season thanks to the 11th team].

“For the totalling of competition points for semi-finals eligibility, for the three teams playing the extra game we will disregard their worst result from rounds one to 11, and that gives each club 17 [results] in each grade, that’s the fairest way we could do it.”

The draw applies to the mandatory first, second and colts grade competitions, while Veenstra said the third grade competition was set to receive a timely boost.

“We have seven clubs confirmed to have third grade sides, and Rhinos have also given us an undertaking that they may well have a third grade side as well,” he said.

“Where we can have them playing as often as possible, we will, and obviously with more clubs that makes it easier. It’s been a challenge to get these draw out, it was particularly difficult for the Blowes Clothing Cup. We’re all excited to see how it works.”

With the addition of Temora and Cootamundra, the GrainCorp Cup has been split into three groups of five - south, middle and north - and they will play each other in a round robin for 10 rounds, before playing another six games after that.

“Two from the middle, Blayney and Canowindra, go to the south while CSU Orange, Molong and Yeoval go to the north division (after round 10),” Veenstra said.

“We’ve made that decision to lessen the travel for each club throughout the competition.”

All the CWRU competitions kick off on Saturday, April 7, with Emus hosting athurst Bulldogs in round one and Orange City travelling to Parkes.