However it also means Southern Inland clubs will again have to deal with an extra number of byes this season.

Following Deniliquin's withdrawal due to a lack of playing numbers, Southern Inland were forced to change their season's structure.

There will now be no playing on the Saturday after the Wagga Gold Cup in May, over the June long weekend as well in July.

Southern Inland rugby manager Jack Heffernan thought it was the best alternative.

"The board was pretty comfortable with just introducing some byes to stretch it out," Heffernan said.

"It's the best result without having a July grand final or having to change the start date we had given to all the clubs and members.

"We were pretty well locked into the start date but it was just trying to make sure we had most of our teams still playing in August.

"Obviously half of them will finish up in July but hopefully we will have a good representation of our clubs heading into the finals series."

The season will start on April 6 with Leeton making their return to the competition with a clash against premiers Waratahs at Conolly Rugby Complex.

Ag College will face their closest rivals Reddies, Wagga City heads to Tumut while Griffith hosts Albury.

The grand final will now be played on August 17.

Waratahs coach Nick McCarthy believes the gap between the byes will suit clubs.

The playing group has been particularly supportive.

"As a club we're supportive of the byes," McCarthy said.

"The players last year felt it was a pretty full-on season with only one week off.

"It was a bit of a sprint last year so they're ok with a break to look after their bodies and the fact there's some uniformity with four weeks on, a break, four weeks on, a break, three weeks on and a break is pretty good to manage players."

However Southern Inland only confirmed their April 6 start date last month.

It's something he hopes they can address going forward.

"It's nice to have the draw now," McCarthy said.

"We understand it is difficult with nominations coming in late or sporadically but it would have been nice to have a start date a lot earlier as it's been really difficult to plan a pre-season and trial games when we had such a late start date release."

With the April 6 date already announced, Ag College counterpart Tom Lamond thought Southern Inland had no choice but to stick with it.

"It's got its pros and cons but there's not much we can do when they have already set the date for that start when Deni were already in the comp," Lamond said.

April 6

Griffith v Albury

Tumut v Wagga City

Ag College v Reddies

Waratahs v Leeton