RWC Draw

[Stargazer]

Line-ups for tomorrow's first RWC qualifier between Samoa and Germany:

Samoa:

1 Logovii Mulipola, 2 Motu Matu'u, 3 Paul Alo-Emile, 4 Josh Tyrell, 5 Chris Vui (C), 6 Piula Fa'aselele, 7 Jack Lam, 8 Ofisa Treviranus, 9 Melani Matavao, 10 Tusi Pisi, 11 Sinoti Sinoti, 12 Alapati Leiua, 13 Paul Perez, 14 Ed Fidow, 15 Ah See Tuala.

Reserves: 16 Seilala Lam, 17 Jordan Lay, 18 Viliamu Afatia, 19 Joe Tekori, 20 TJ Ioane, 21 Dwayne Polataivao, 22 Patrick Fa'apale, 23 Alofa Alofa.

Unavailable due to injury: Rey Lee-Lo

.

Germany:

1 Julius Nostadt (C), 2 Michail Tyumenev, 3 Samy Fuchsel, 4 Timo Vollenkemper, 5 Eric Marks, 6 Marcel Henn, 7 Jaco Otto, 8 Sebastian Ferreira, 9 Sean Armstrong, 10 Christopher Hilsenbeck, 11 Nikolai Klewinghaus, 12 Raynor Parkinson, 13 Steffen Liebig, 14 Marcel Coetzee, 15 Maxime Oltmann.

Reserves: 16 Mark Fairhurst, 17 Jarrid Els, 18 Jorn Schroder, 19 Antony Dickinson, 20 Falk Duwe, 21 Tim Menzel, 22 Pierre Mathurin, 23 Pascal Fischer.

LIVE
Kick-off is at 2.10pm NZ time (3.10pm local)

NZ: Sky Sport 1 from 2.00pm
World Rugby YouTube channel
Germany Rugby's Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/DRVRugby/

[Machpants]

There's a lot of kiwis in that Samoa team, go Samoa! I think they should smash the Germans, channel their inner Korean

[antipodean]

In the event the master race beats Samoa, I can already picture Eliota Fuimaono-Sapolu's racist tweet.

[Rapido]

Cook Islands also play Hong Kong today. Winner (over 2 legs) goes through to the repechage tournament.

The Cooks have fortified their team with NZ and Aus based players. Sam Anderson-Heather and Shahn Eru in CI team.

[Machpants]

Samoa looking comfortable with a 66-15 victory over Germany on their home leg!

[Chris B.]

Is that the full strength Samoa team; i.e. did the IRB require that all their players be made available to them?

Anyone in that team from an NZ Super team?

[ARHS]

@chris-b

Would not appear to be. No Fotuali'i, Lemi, Fonotia, Lee-Lo (injured), Nanai-Williams (injured), Brighouse, Taulagi, Johnson, G Pisi, K Pisi, Nikoro, Levave, Leuila, Lemalu, Leiataua. But probably not too much difference between these guys and the ones who played, so maybe a lot of these available, but just not picked - and some key guys injured.

[Stargazer]

World Rugby have announced that France will host the repechage tournament for Rugby World Cup 2019. The venue will be the Stade Delort in Marseille.

The tournament will take place in November 2018. The format is a four-team round-robin across three match days: Sunday 11 November, Saturday 17 November and Friday 23 November, 2018

Competing nations:
Canada (loser of the Americas 2 play-offs)
Hong Kong (winner of the Asia-Oceania play-offs)
The loser of the Germany v Samoa play-offs (most likely Germany)
The runners-up of the Rugby Africa Gold Cup (currently Kenya is second on the table behind Namibia, with two games to play, of which Namibia v Kenya on the 18th of August might be decisive).

The winner of the repechage will join NZ, SA, Italy and Africa 1 in pool B.

world.rugby

Latest News | World Rugby

The latest World Rugby news, including about the World Rankings, Tournaments, Player Welfare and the Laws of the Game

[Billy Tell]

@stargazer said in RWC Draw:

World Rugby have announced that France will host the repechage tournament for Rugby World Cup 2019. The venue will be the Stade Delort in Marseille.

The tournament will take place in November 2018. The format is a four-team round-robin across three match days: Sunday 11 November, Saturday 17 November and Friday 23 November, 2018

Competing nations:
Canada (loser of the Americas 2 play-offs)
Hong Kong (winner of the Asia-Oceania play-offs)
The loser of the Germany v Samoa play-offs (most likely Germany)
The runners-up of the Rugby Africa Gold Cup (currently Kenya is second on the table behind Namibia, with two games to play, of which Namibia v Kenya on the 18th of August might be decisive).

The winner of the repechage will join NZ, SA, Italy and Africa 1 in pool B...

...should we be worried?

[Machpants]

About having shit opposition again, yes

[Stargazer]

The return match between Germany and Samoa will be played tonight (Sun 15 July, k/o 2.00am). The game will be livestreamed on World Rugby's YouTube.

Germany:
1 Julius Nostadt, 2 Mark Fairhurst, 3 Samy Füchsel, 4 Eric Marks, 5 Timo Vollenkemper, 6 Sebastian Ferreira, 7 Jaco Otto, 8 Jarrid Els, 9 Sean Armstrong, 10 Hagen Schulte, 11 Marcel Coetzee, 12 Raynor Parkinson, 13 Mathieu Ducau, 14 Rafael Pyrasch, 15 Christopher Hilsenbeck

Reserves:
16 Mika Tyumenev, 17 Luke Dyckhoff, 18 Jörn Schröder, 19 Mathias Schösser, 20 Marcel Henn, 21 Tim Menzel, 22 Nikolai Klewinghaus, 23 Florian Wehrspann

Samoa
1 Logovii Mulipola, 2. Motu Matu'u, 3. Paul Alo-Emile, 4. Joe Tekori, 5. Brandon Nansen, 6. Tupa'i Chris Vui (c), 7. Jack Lam, 8. Ofisa Treviranus, 9. Melani Matavao, 10. Patrick Fa'apale, 11. Sinoti Sinoti, 12. Lemalu Tusi Pisi, 13. Paul Perez, 14. Ed Fidow, 15. Ah See Tuala

Reserves:
16 Seilala Lam, 17. Jordan Lay, 18. Viliamu Afatia, 19. Mat Luamanu, 20. TJ Ioane, 21. Ionatana Tino, 22. Rodney Iona, 23. Alofa Alofa

Injured Player(s): Rey Lee-Lo, Josh Tyrell, Piula Fa’asalele

[Higgins]

That Samoan team looks like a mid table Mitre10 Cup lineup.

[Stargazer]

As expected, although Samoa were trailing (28 - 21) with 15 minutes to go. Two tries to Ah See Tuala and one scored by Ed Fidow secured a late 28 - 42 win. On aggregate, Samoa won 108 - 43, so it was never in doubt who would take the last spot in pool A.

Match report: https://www.rugbyworldcup.com/news/348796

[Machpants]

We've deff got the worst pool, it'll be another bunch of games with the ABs playing purposefully with one hand tied behind their backs

[mariner4life]

@machpants said in RWC Draw:

We've deff got the worst pool, it'll be another bunch of games with the ABs playing purposefully with one hand tied behind their backs

Which pool would you rather have? Boks and italy is nice.

[Machpants]

Taking England place in pool three would be nice, but yeah going back to 16 teams would be better

[mariner4life]

@machpants said in RWC Draw:

Taking England place in pool three would be nice, but yeah going back to 16 teams would be better

WTF? So we've gone from definitely having the worst piol, to maybe being in one other pool, to let's cut a bunch of teams

[Machpants]

You asked me which pool, I said c. Both other pools are better, esp since we play boks first up.

All the bottom teams each pool will not win a game, will not even be competitive, and are utterly pointless as they have been since every twenty team tournament. Just an opportunity for some good players to get accidentally injured. That's What The Fuck

[Bovidae]

Ideally the ABs would prefer that the SA game was the last pool game, not the first, as the pool winner would be decided then.

But playing Italy last is a better option than the alternative - a Repechage Winner or Africa 1.

[mariner4life]

@machpants said in RWC Draw:

You asked me which pool, I said c. Both other pools are better, esp since we play boks first up.

All the bottom teams each pool will not win a game, will not even be competitive, and are utterly pointless as they have been since every twenty team tournament. Just an opportunity for some good players to get accidentally injured. That's What The Fuck

You said we def had the worst pool. I like ours better than A. And maybe D as well. 1 real test, 1 game we have to show up for, two training runs.

There are shit teams, but that is the cost of growth. And things must be getting better, the minnows got murdered in 2003.