New Zealand’s domestic women’s rugby tournament, The Farah Palmer Cup, has been confirmed to start on September 5.

The competition was originally meant to get underway on August 22 but due to a recent spike in Covid-19 cases in the country it was postponed.

The restart means the tournament will be able to play all of their scheduled matches, with the final taking place on the last weekend of October.

New Zealand’s Head of Women’s Rugby Cate Sexton said: “A number of options were presented to Provincial Unions and they worked collaboratively and promptly to agree on this outcome.

“This give our teams some certainty in the preparations over the next few weeks and, depending on what happens with Alert Levels, we hope the Auckland-based teams will be able to train together again soon."

Canterbury are the current champions of the Cup and will start their title defence against Manawatu.