Mining magnate turned rugby philanthropist Andrew ‘Twiggy’ Forrest remains hopeful teams from western Sydney and New Zealand will join World Series Rugby despite the national unions from those countries ruling out such a step until at least 2020.

Forrest’s vision for an eight-team rebel competition with a $1 million prize purse was delivered a significant setback last month when Rugby Australia and their counterparts over the ditch indicated they would not support his plan to get a team each in western Sydney and New Zealand in time for the 2019 season kick-off in March.

Soldiering on: Andrew 'Twiggy' Forrest is still hopeful his idea will come to fruition soon. Credit:Richard Wainwright

With the new Super Rugby agreement to start in 2021 and the global calendar on a similar time frame, both Rugby Australia (RA) and NSW Rugby want more time to work out how a second professional team playing in a different competition would work in the existing landscape.

It means that apart from the Western Force, World Series Rugby will not have any Australian or New Zealand teams until 2020 at the very earliest.