How to rank this RWC?
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Overall?
Thought the Group stage dragged, and there wasn't much in the way of jeopardy for most games outside of Pool C.
The QF weekend was arguably the best weekend of rugby ever.
Semi final weekend was the same as ever, one close game and one not so close (though we put on a few more points than normal)
And so, it comes to the final game to decide if it's a great tournament. We get a dull game that'll lose the neutrals. If either side pumps the other, then half of the involved fans will think it's been shit. If we get a thriller i think in everyone's mind outside of Ireland, it will be hailed as a great world cup.I always had in my head that 2003 was best World Cup. This has been pretty good from Quarters on.
For ABs?
Win and this is our best ever, thanks to the low expectations. There won't be the overwhelming sense of relief of 2011, but this is a redemption arc for a host of people. Beat the #1 ranked team in the world twice.
Lose and it's a shit tournament where we lost our first ever pool game, beat a bunch of shit teams, got up once to knock over an end-of-the-road Ireland, predictably beat Argentina, and then lost again to the Boks despite being favourites. History is written by winners.Can't speak for the saffers, but on paper it's been quite a run of games. Winning the Cup despite playing all of Ireland, France, NZ and England is a pretty decent story to tell.
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@mariner4life said in How to rank this RWC?:
Overall?
Thought the Group stage dragged, and there wasn't much in the way of jeopardy for most games outside of Pool C.
The QF weekend was arguably the best weekend of rugby ever.
Semi final weekend was the same as ever, one close game and one not so close (though we put on a few more points than normal)
And so, it comes to the final game to decide if it's a great tournament. We get a dull game that'll lose the neutrals. If either side pumps the other, then half of the involved fans will think it's been shit. If we get a thriller i think in everyone's mind outside of Ireland, it will be hailed as a great world cup.I always had in my head that 2003 was best World Cup. This has been pretty good from Quarters on.
For ABs?
Win and this is our best ever, thanks to the low expectations. There won't be the overwhelming sense of relief of 2011, but this is a redemption arc for a host of people. Beat the #1 ranked team in the world twice.
Lose and it's a shit tournament where we lost our first ever pool game, beat a bunch of shit teams, got up once to knock over an end-of-the-road Ireland, predictably beat Argentina, and then lost again to the Boks despite being favourites. History is written by winners.Can't speak for the saffers, but on paper it's been quite a run of games. Winning the Cup despite playing all of Ireland, France, NZ and England is a pretty decent story to tell.
I was thinking the same, but then thought we will have basically done the same, just swapping England for Argentina. Guess the difference is England got up for the SF whereas the Argies did not (or were not allowed to after a decent start)
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@mariner4life said in How to rank this RWC?:
I always had in my head that 2003 was best World Cup.
Because you went to it?
Personally I think it was one of the worst.
No upsets except arguably Oz turning us over in the semi's. Dominated by the boot. Tense but boring final.
Compared to 2015 Japan upset South Africa, England fail to get out of the group of death. Ireland beat France to top their pool then lose to Argentina in QF.
Oz beat Scotland with a controversial penalty in last minute of their QF.
SA take NZ to the brink until Carter grab the game and refuses to lose.AB's repeat for first time in a great game of flowing rugby. Host of legends GOATS retire.
How doer you beat that?
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@mariner4life ....thats actually sums things up pretty well
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@dogmeat nah, i went to like 1 game.
There was a good buzz around Aus though (i was over here for the pool stages), games were spread around and well supported. I don't remember the boot dominating, except for England, who still played some bloody good rugby at times. I think the only dreary game i remember is the England v France semi final, where it rained and the Poms ground them in to the turf.
2015 felt like an AB procession (but that England/Wales/Australia was the best pool of all time).
The only RWC i've done in bulk was 2011. I had a fucking ball and saw so many teams play i had never seen before nor since.
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@mariner4life said in How to rank this RWC?:
@dogmeat nah, i went to like 1 game.
The only RWC i've done in bulk was 2011. I had a fucking ball and saw so many teams play i had never seen before nor since.
will always be a huge disappointment personally (not the results obviously) had venue tickets for chch and working on playoff tickets....then the earthquake, tickets cancelled and even 6 months later the idea to travelling to games (assuming we could get tickets) was so far down the priority list
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@mariner4life said in How to rank this RWC?:
The only RWC i've done in bulk was 2011. I had a fucking ball and saw so many teams play i had never seen before nor since.
This tournament was epic. Having so many teams near each other physically was great - NZ is very compact. Festival atmosphere with the support, and in particular TOnga. Shut down the airport. Great pool matches (Aus Ire) and then segued into solid knockout games. Knockouts weren't epics unless you were a kiwi carrying a gorilla I suspect ... and Wales getting bowled because of spears.
Was a sensational festival of rugby.
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@nzzp said in How to rank this RWC?:
@mariner4life said in How to rank this RWC?:
The only RWC i've done in bulk was 2011. I had a fucking ball and saw so many teams play i had never seen before nor since.
This tournament was epic. Having so many teams near each other physically was great - NZ is very compact. Festival atmosphere with the support, and in particular TOnga. Shut down the airport. Great pool matches (Aus Ire) and then segued into solid knockout games. Knockouts weren't epics unless you were a kiwi carrying a gorilla I suspect ... and Wales getting bowled because of spears.
Was a sensational festival of rugby.
How many cars were driving around with those little flags flapping from their cars, felt like every other car on the road had one. Mine included! Was a fun festival time (until things became serious and NZ collectively shat its pants when DC went down) Then the buzz of 'its ok Weepu has this' hype started to build.
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The great thing about 2011 was the opportunity to see some of the lesser teams. I saw both the USA and Russia twice, as well as Namibia, and even the England-France QF as a neutral. It's the overseas fans that create the atmosphere in the pool games, especially. Rotorua definitely stood out with the Fijians and Irish.
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@dogmeat said in How to rank this RWC?:
@MN5 said in How to rank this RWC?:
a terrific time to be living in Sydney
Unpossible
Sorry am I missing something ?
Sydney is terrific
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So I just started listening to the Rugby Daily podcast ranking the world cups. Worst and second worst were 1987 and 2011. I get 1987, it wasn't a big event or anywhere near fully formed. But the criticism of 2011 included gems like "it needs a country to get behind it" and "the weather was terrible". Is my memory completely failing me? I saw every match and can't remember any terrible weather. I was at the final in perfect weather and massive drama. Compared to say 2007, it was miles ahead. 2007 certainly didn't have one country behind it, the winners didn't play a hard match (will try not to mention why...). 2015 was great for us and I thought the rugby was pretty good, but the hosts going out in the pools surely didn't help.
Then we got Bryan Habana speaking for 10 minutes about 1995. Great for South Africa as a country, yes, but seriously dodgy in how they won it (both the semi and the final).
An interesting fact about world cups is there have often been 2 teams obviously destined to meet in the final in a heavyweight clash but it happens so rarely. 2023, 2015, 1995 being the exceptions. I guess you could argue 1991 given we were always going to meet Australia in the semi-final.
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One of the best World Cups I think but a little behind 1995 and 2011 in my mind.
Positives: Going into the tournament there were four or five realistically possible winners, holding the tournament in a single country is always best, Portugal defying expectations, great to see a range of playing styles, wonderful Quarter Finals, hopefully a classic final to come, France have been good hosts.
Neagatives: Pool play went on too long, Sides looking to slow the game down have largely got away with it, the hosts going out in the QFs has dampened the atmosphere a bit, Rugby Union no longer seems to captivate my neighbours and acquaintances.
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@Richie8-7 obviously trolling.
87 and 11 were two of the cups in contention for best ever IMO.
Before @Duluth started this thread was going to start a poll, and was seriously going to leave out 91, 99 and 07.
Those three were absolute rubbish for quality of rugby.
The rest all have a claim to being some sort of awesome.
The reason I didn't post a poll in the end was I couldn't work out how to do a preferential vote, as I reckon each of the other seven have a claim on being the best.
This version though? Down the list somewhat for me.
Maybe it was a timezone thing, but despite close scores in the meaningless matches I found it overall reasonably meh.
Any of 87, 95, 03, 11, 15 and 19 beats 23 for me.
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Until 2015 - which was great I don't think there had been a really good RWC hosted in Europe.
They were never 'big' events, spread across too many locations and didn't have a buzz.
I was living in London for 87 and it did all seem a bit hokey TBH
95 and 2011 were epic 2003 less so. Japan was quite good despite it being a 'small' event for the host country. Possibly because of a sympathetic time zone.
This one - @sparky pretty much nailed it for me.
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Quite a few of the hyped pool games failed to live up to expectations from a neutral point of view.
Scotland-Boks, Scotland-Ireland, England-Argentina, Wales-Australia come to mind. Italy weren't even semi competitive vs ABs or France
Of course this isn't unique to this World Cup and other teams performed above expectations going in (Portgual & Japan) but on paper I thought pool play would be even more competitive than it was.
