In precisely one year’s time - on September 8, 2023 - the men's Rugby World Cup will get under way in France.
With 365 days to go until the opening fixture, just how are the main contenders for the Webb Ellis trophy shaping up and who are the favourites to be crowned champions? Rugby correspondent Simon Thomas surveys the global scene.
A Gallic Grin
Amid the wildly fluctuating nature of this summer’s Rugby Championship, one team will be happiest of all - France!
Les Blues head coach Fabien Galthie will no doubt have been sporting a Gallic grin at the hugely inconsistent performances of the southern hemisphere superpowers, while Shaun Edwards will be even more pumped than usual.
Given France’s form over the past couple of years, the travails of the big guns down south and the fact they have home advantage, history beckons for the three times runners-up.
Seldom before has a northern hemisphere country looked in pole position a year out from a World Cup, but that’s the situation we are in now given the current global pecking order. In fact, the hosts’ biggest challengers could yet prove to be another Six Nations side, in the shape of Ireland, who are a fraction ahead of them at the top of the world rankings.
It’s an unusual situation but it’s very much a reflection of the fact that the southern sides have all shown varying vulnerabilities over this summer.
New Zealand had a home series defeat to the Irish, while Australia endured the same fate against England. Then, of course, you had the Springboks losing a Test to Wales on South African soil for the first time.
And now we’ve embarked upon a Rugby Championship where all four competing teams have had days to forget, delivering performances that don’t bode well for their World Cup hopes.
Never before has the southern hemisphere tournament been so up and down, never before have the sides displayed such inconsistency right across the board.
It has been an absolute switchback ride. Just look at the sequence of matches.
Week 1, South Africa beat New Zealand in Nelspruit and Australia defeat Argentina out in Mendoza. Week 2 and you get the reverse results in the re-matches in Johannesburg and San Juan.
Week 3 and 4 sees the same template, with the Wallabies seeing off the Springboks at the Adelaide Oval and the Pumas claiming an historic win over the All Blacks in Christchurch, only for the tables to be emphatically turned seven days later in Sydney and Hamilton.
So where does that leave us? Well without any of the usual southern suspects really standing out as frontrunners for the World Cup. They have all played some cracking stuff at times over the past month or so, but they have also put in some pretty wretched displays.
In contrast, France have been a model of consistency, recording ten consecutive victories, their best post-war winning streak. That’s a run they extended with back-to-back triumphs out in Japan where they showed their strength in depth by taking the series despite the absence of the likes of Antoine Dupont, Romain Ntamack, Gregory Alldritt and Cyril Baille.
They have been steadily growing in stature over the last few seasons, while they will have two major motivations in a year's time - wanting to deliver for their own fans on home soil and doing it for centre Virimi Vakatawa, who has had to retire from rugby due to a heart condition. With these dual drivers and a winning habit, they have to be seen as being in the box seat right now.
The one team that comes close to them in terms of recent reliability is Ireland, who have only lost two of their last 15 Test matches. During that period, they have also beaten the All Blacks no fewer than three times.
Not so mighty All Blacks
Which brings us on to New Zealand. Just how mighty are they these days? Normally, a year out from a World Cup, they would be most people’s default favourites to be crowned champions, but it’s doubtful whether that’s the case this time around. The aura of invincibility that traditionally surrounds them just isn’t there right now, on the back of a first home series loss to the Irish and a first home defeat to Argentina.
Those failures have seen the pressure mount on under-fire head coach Ian Foster, with questions being asked over his future. Each time the heat has been turned up to Gas Mark 9, he has managed to survive thanks to his team producing bounce-back victories, over the Springboks in Ellis Park and then with last weekend’s 53-3 romp against Argentina.
But opinion will doubtless be divvied among Kiwi fans over whether Foster staying on is the best thing for their World Cup hopes. Those supporters just aren’t used to the kind of losses they have endured this summer. Then again, whoever is at the helm, it’s questionable whether this All Blacks group could go all the way. It just doesn’t contain the number of stellar names you are used to seeing don the black fern.
We will learn more about this new-look group over the coming weeks and months, with back-to-back games against the Wallabies completing their Rugby Championship campaign and then an autumn tour of the UK to follow, starting with a game against Wales at the Principality Stadium on November 5.
Given the recent wobbles from the All Blacks, it’s inevitable there will be mention of 1953 and finally ending 69 years of hurt going into that Cardiff clash. Now I’ve heard such talk come to nought so often in the past that one is fearful of tempting fate. But Wales have laid one bogey to rest this year with that landmark win out in Bloemfontein, so hope springs eternal!
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That second Test victory over the Springboks and the even better performance during the series opener in Pretoria came as a real pleasant surprise after a disappointing Six Nations campaign which had culminated in the woeful home defeat to Italy. It showed the value of consistent selection, with Wayne Pivac moving away from his previous tinkering tendency and settling on his strongest side. He also got it right tactically, with a more conservative, risk-free approach proving the correct way to go at altitude, amid an effective kicking strategy, stoic defence and competing hard at the breakdown, as they fronted up physically to the beefy ‘Boks.
It was also a series that revealed a few cracks in the South African armour and there has been further evidence of that with the defeats to New Zealand and Australia. The somewhat limited territorial game-plan that brought them World Cup glory in 2019 hasn’t been quite as remorselessly effective of late, leaving their champions crown teetering somewhat precariously.
It will be fascinating now to see whether they look to expand their game and move away from a heavy reliance on box-kicking and sheer physical power. In fairness, there were signs of them doing just that last weekend, with the superb passage of play that saw the ball go through 15 pairs of hands ahead of flanker Franco Mostert crossing in the corner during the victory over the Wallabies.
So we wait with great interest to see what the holders will come up with as the best strategy to defend their title and how their rivals will look to grasp it off them.
The tournament-defining draw
There is then one other factor to consider which will have a major bearing on what happens in 12 months time. That’s the competition draw.
Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, World Rugby decided the seedings for the tournament would be based on how the world rankings looked at the start of 2020. At that time, Wales were reigning Six Nations Grand Slam champions and ranked fourth - in sharp contrast to their current ninth. So it meant they were among the top seeds when the pools were drawn in December 2020, thereby avoiding being grouped with any of the top three at the time - the All Blacks, the Springboks or England.
Ireland and France, meanwhile, who now stand one and two in the rankings, were only second seeds based on where they stood at the start of 2020.
The resulting format means two of the current top four of Ireland, France, South Africa and New Zealand will miss out on the semi finals as they are all on the same side of the draw and are likely to be the sides that make up two truly titanic tussles at the quarter-final stage. Former England star and rugby journalist Stuart Barnes has described this as a “horrendous situation”, with the “ridiculously early” draw having “distorted” the tournament.
What it does mean is the other half of the draw has been opened up for two teams from outside the current top four to progress to the semi-finals, with Australia, England, Wales and Argentina the prime contenders. Of those, Eddie Jones’ English outfit are perhaps the hardest to pass judgement on. They have finished fifth in the last two Six Nations, but they triumphed Down Under this summer while missing a host of regular starters. The big question is whether Jones can hit upon the right combination from the plentiful depth at this disposal. In the likes of Maro Itoje, Tom Curry, Courtney Lawes, Billy Vunipola and Ellis Genge he has real top quality forwards to call upon, along with gifted young back-line talents in Marcus Smith and Freddie Steward.
So they are not to be discounted and their progress will be of particular interest on this side of Offa’s Dyke. That’s because, looking at the tournament road map, there’s a decent chance of ending up with a quarter-final clash between Jones’ England and Pivac’s Wales in Marseilles on October 15 next year, with a last four spot up for grabs. Now that would be some occasion!
There’s still a fair bit of water to flow under the bridge before then and a lot can happen in 12 months, amid fluctuations in form, injuries and new stars emerging. But the countdown to France 2023 is now very much on and, as it stands, the host nation look the team to beat.
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