Talk Morgan Forums Community The Malvern Arms Rugby World Cup 2023

What a dilemma, he is spoilt isn't he lucky boy.
It should be a belter with Ireland in top form.

Unfortunately, the AB's have not been in such good form since that upset in Chicago when Ireland defeated them and bought to an end their 50 plus games unbeaten record. Watching how well the AB,s performed the other day, may be a sign they are on the way back to their pre unbeaten previous form. Time will tell, but its a game we will share live with all our NZ and Irish friends and family on a whatsapp group call, although the slight match time delay, with NZ being about a minute behind does mean we have to curb our reactions, so not to spoil the upcoming moments for them. They do the same for us when the games are based in the southern hemisphere when we experience the time delay. Before whats app etc we used to phone NZ and put the phone on loud speaker on the coffee table for the entirety of the game, so we could share the moments together, the world cups could get quite expensive after a while even with special phone rates deals, but it was worth it.

Should be quite a night. In reality, whilst we call the team Ireland, its mainly Leinster players which does give them an edge as they all play together all year round and many have come up thru the same limited number of rugby playing schools and thru the the Leinster academy, not unlike the NZ rugby playing schools and academy system.

I still think South Africa is the dark horse to watch out for, if their kicking game had been on form, they would have defeated Ireland the other week...........its good to see Fiji in the quarters. I do despair with England, although traditionally they always do well once they get past the indifferent/poor performance in the pool games. I'm less certain this time and we certainly don't deserve it based on current performance.

I agree with all you said above but I do think Frances performance even without Dupont was impressive the other night and look forward to watching more of them as well.

Based on yesterdays performance alone it's England not Scotland that should be coming home tbh.

You have to wonder how England would be playing if they'd picked Ireland's English coach?
Though of course he has a rugby league background, so maybe that's a step too far!

Drawing the pools based on 2020 rankings was tough on Scotland - ranked 5th going into the tournament they've had the 1st & 2nd ranked teams to play, so getting out of the pool was always going to be tough.

Ireland look ruthless: what was that 'red zone' stat last night - over 4 points for every visit to the Scots' 22? That's amazing.

South Africa's best hope of winning the tournament is to find a kicker - they can do everything else, so why hand your opponents half a dozen points each game?

Will

The French do look the most impressive so far, Ireland has the loadstone of crumbling every time it comes to the quarter finals, South Africa needs to find a reliable kicker and NZ haven't been consistent enough of late. The rest IMHO are there just to make the numbers up and any injuries may start to affect performance. It will be interesting to see if they try to take Sexton out, as he is the talisman and the keystone of any Irish performance

Magnificent effort from Portugal tonight beating Fiji and winning their first World Cup game, they will take a lot home from this experience.

One commenter mentioned in passing it would also be nice (as in the Rugby 7's) to have a World Cup shield, to be part of the championship. Possibly allowing those teams that don't progress beyond the pool games to have a separate elimination quarters, semi and final for the Shield, It would increase the opportunity for teams that don't get to play as much ,as the other teams, and introduce further competition. In effect, it would include more equally balanced teams such as Portugal to play with more tier 2 teams, outside their current pool and recognise the rugby contribution they have made to the championship.

I'm being a little selfish as it means more rugby for me to watch, but based on Portugal's performance last night I'd far rather have them in the 6 nations than Italy. I feel with the right level of competition the Portuguese game will improve and be more competitive at a higher level than what we have seen of Italy's achievements since joining the 6 nations.

Yes, that would be a good idea a bit of encouragement goes a long way.

This is a nice touch too and very rugby.

No such thing as too much good rugby.

Gone quiet hasn't it...

Great game and the Pumas deserved the win, the Wales team were ill disciplined and gave away so many penalties that the Pumas scored from. The Sanchez try was the very best of them.

2000hrs match will be a stormer Can Eire surprise the Kiwis, I don't think it's impossible they are playing such a high standard right now who knows we could see an Eire v France final...

Argentina showed their improved form in their last game, so I was backing them to win., if Ireland allow NZ to play their game then it could be a very close game Still unsure as to the outcome of the Ireland NZ game.