2023 RWC Buildup, Squads, Fixtures 'etc'

Fair point.I think we can agree that the US and Canada are very distinct outliers here though? They've only introduced pro rugby in the last 4, 5 years is it? While you can't discount or underestimate the enormous dominance of those 3 major American sports. Hosting the World Cup might, like the soccer equivalent back in 1994, kick off a more aggressive phase of development but even kickball has had small, iterative gains in those 30 years. Interestingly, it's the women's game that has rocketed into global dominance, not the men's.

Sure soccer is the prime sport in all those ascendent countries but I daresay Uruguay has far more runway for an upward trajectory than America - even though there's a huge disparity between each country's population and GDP. On paper the US should dominate all sports really - yet it's funny how they, China and India are these giant No Man's Land for soccer. Maybe the fact you don't get failed US football players arriving in your squads helps for more refined rugby player development in Uruguay, Portugal etc. I dunno.

FWIW, America does have a team, the American Raptors, competing in the South American Super League so alongside the Major League maybe that'll help the US improve by 2031, 'cos it'll be a huge embarrassment if they fail to qualify again for 2027. While most of the Uruguayan squad play for the country's SL team, Peñarol. Ditto Chile and their squad mostly made of players for Selknam. Ala Fiji with their own "league team but it's basically a feeder for the national one", it'll hopefully help consolidate improvement.

And maybe those structures or Ireland's provincial approach is adopted in other European countries and we'll see teams get better again. Some here lament the stagnation in England and Australia, but I see possibility for growth if its cultivated. I see Portugal's squad seems more of a mix of origins, many in the D2.

It probably also helps these minnows have been very entertaining to watch. I don't think the same enthusiasm might exist had all these new faces been playing like Georgia, no harm to them.

It's the benchmark though in terms of "is this country's Rugby good enough to play at a higher level?"; no more than the national team being the top of the pyramid here in the Ireland, or fadó when Argentina started making inroads into World Rugby, it was at the World Cup that you could put a marker down. Lately for Georgia it has been the Autumn Internationals of course, but as Tier 2 doesn't have any look into that window, they have to focus on the World Cup as the final exam for improvement.