General Rugby Discussion 3

Argentina beat NZ in NZ...

A huge result....the lack of interest on boards is telling.

Hope to anyone that thinks England have improved dramatically after the summer will be given a reality check after today.

Is that the thing with the breakdancing, skateboarding for teenage girls and 3 v 3 basketball?

This pos was seig heiling at the Belfast race riot a couple of weeks ago. Full Ulster kit on him. Jaysus.

https://m.sundayworld.com/crime/courts/boxes-of-religious-pamphlets-found-in-loyalists-home-aimed-at-stirring-up-hatred/a204800212.html

That is extremely poor and I’d be very upset as a parent if I heard of that happening in any club my kids were involved with.

Lots of changes to SA starting team to face Australia again this weekend. Not sure why both Libbok and Pollard are on the bench though.

Springbok team:

15 Aphelele Fassi, 14 Cheslin Kolbe, 13 Jesse Kriel, 12 Lukhanyo Am, 11 Makazole Mapimpi, 10 Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu, 9 Morne van den Berg, 8 Elrigh Louw, 7 Pieter-Steph du Toit, 6 Marco van Staden, 5 Ruan Nortje, 4 Salmaan Moerat (captain), 3 Thomas du Toit, 2 Johan Grobbelaar, 1 Jan-Hendrik Wessels

Substitutes: 16 Malcolm Marx, 17 Ox Nche, 18 Vincent Koch, 19 Eben Etzebeth, 20 Kwagga Smith, 21 Grant Williams, 22 Manie Libbok, 23 Handre Pollard

I'm a big fan of Morne van den Berg at 9. Think he could emerge as a Springbok 9 in time (even though Grant Williams has looked really good of late too).

Only slightly different from the team who played Portugal last month, says it all. But never know with Australia. They did pick up 3 injuries last week though.

Could still be because of this. Not that im sure he would be picked if he was fit.

https://www.rugbypass.com/news/jean-kleyns-season-ending-injury-worse-than-thought/

Awful stuff. Complete lack of jeopardy in the group stages. With four of six "best 3rd placed teams" into the Round of 16, the odds of seeing a meaningful loss are more or less zero. Teams will know that every game is not a "must win" in the Group Stages which has a huge potential to really reduce the quality of games.

If never seen this actually come true. Hurling is forever changing structures to help weaker teams and it just leads to pastings.

URC and 6 Nations really haven't brought Italy on all that much either. And no amount of participation has made the smaller soccer nations competitive.

Nothing I have seen suggests these hammerings increase spectator participation either.

So your saying we used have 2 hammerings over 4 groups so 8 hammerings. Now its 2x6 so 12. Added to that a round of 16 in a sport that doesn't have 16 high quality teams so probably a few walkover knockout games too.

But the much more important part is you are bringing in a wonky, generally unpopular system just to "grow" smaller teams but I see no evidence across sport that playing the bigger teams brings you on.

As usual with these expansions I don't see it being about anything more than money.

Maybe this is happening already I don't know but games development officers paid for by World Rugby in schools and academies in these nations would be way more beneficial.

Again I have never seen any evidence in any sport that tournament expansion brings teams on.

Also and this isn't just for rugby but why do pro sports "have to grow" ?

Just thinking here as a cycling fan for instance I think most people were happier when the sport was concentrated around the heartlands rather than forcing meaningless races around the world. What's wrong with just having a high quality tournament for the places that really care.

Also in the UK they haven't even managed to grow the sport outside of it's traditional base so good luck with Spain and Portugal.

I mostly just fuking hate 6 group tournaments. Seeing as the Euros were so desperate to expand I'de rather they went straight from 16 to 32 but rugby doesn't have that option. The new Champions League and new soccer World Cup formats are widely regarded as an absolute joke too.

More and more we are seeing tidy or tight tournaments ruined with American style cross conferences and "Swiss system" leagues all in the name of expansion (money) and I'm sick of it.

Cant think of a single tournament left that is just a simple format a 50% (or close) cut per round and with roughly similar teams.

And Namibia aren't helped outside of the world cup anywhere near enough. They don't get enough games even against a third string Irish side or anyone else

They need a side in currie cup or at least some form of south Africans domestic competition. Same with Kenya and any other southern African sides.

Of Course there is good and bad sides in any sport but rugby all too often keeps the top table a closed shop and doesn't do anywhere near enough to widen the pool of nations ar top table

More game is more times that TV companies can sell advertising and stadiums can sell advertising. Also in most groups 3 of 4 qualify so it will maybe add eyeballs to the mid range nations.

It's less relevant in smaller sports like rugby but it's still the reason. That's what "growing the game" means.

But that's inherently farcical that the 'real tournament starts at the quarter-final stage' and you're pretty much acknowledging that the changes just make the group stage utterly pointless.

Your being a bit facetious by just bringing up Scotland all the time. Australia missed out last time, Argentina before that and England in 2015.

And it's not a "fluke of the draw" it's a direct result of having 20 teams as the optimal number. It creates a group of death or 2 while also not making the tournament too elite.

But you're agreeing then that its more games for the sake of more games. It won't add more top clashes, it'll add more 71-3 type wins (a la New Zealand v Namibia) - what is the point of that?

And its clearly not pointless. As Breezy said, there's been a relatively big name dumped out of the Group every year. How exciting was Pool C this year with Fiji's qualification coming down to the last game. A Round of 16 would just mean that Australia would have had another change at progressing and Fiji's Group Stage win would have been irrelevant. Its ludicrous to say that it wasn't important.

Why should Australia get another crack at it? Who cares if it would be a good game. They had their chance and blew it.

I don't think we do agree.you have to start with the world cup and then build in the other 46 months of the world cup cycle to help do things that in time will see them improve.

Continuing Example of Namibia they would improve if they got more games against sides from the top tier. If they rarely play these sides in november or june/July then how can they improve at a world cup? Same with any other side outside of the 6 nations and rugby championship

These nations don't have playing base in some cases or infrastructure and the top sides don't do enough to help that.