There should be two RWCs
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One consisting of the top tier teams and one consisting of the 2nd tier teams.
Why? Because it would create far more evenly competitive games that would be alot more entertaining to watch and give hope to every team because they have a greater chance of winning. What is the use of scores that blow out to 50 -0 or even 80-0 or even worse 100-0. This is a lose lose situation for both teams. No one really wins.
Far better to have the top twelve nations battle it out for the RWC while twelve of the second tier sides battles it out for the Minnow RWC.
So.... a wild suggestion could be:
The first RWC would have 12 teams to make up 4 pools of 3: England. Wales. France. Ireland. Scotland. Argentina. South Africa. Australia. New Zealand. Italy. One from out of USA, Canada and Japan. And one Island team out of Samoa Tonga or Fiji.
Each team would be split into 4 pools of 3 and the first 2 teams go into the quarters. Semis and the final.
Pool 1. England. Argentina. Island team. Pool 2. NZ. Ireland. Scotland. Pool 3. South Africa. Wales. Italy. Pool 4. Australia. France. American/Japan team.
The team with the least points drops down to the 2nd RWC for the following RWC.
The 2nd RWC would also have 12 teams to make up 4 pools of 3: One Americas and Japan. Two Island teams. Georgia. Russia. Namibia. Uruguay. Japan. Spain. Portugal. Kenya.
Pool 1. American team. Russia. Georgia. Pool 2. Island team. Portugal. Namibia. Pool 3. Japan. Russia. Spain. Pool 4. Island team. Uruguay. Kenya.
Winner of the final is promoted to the first RWC for the following RWC.
The second RWC games would be played just before the first RWC games.
This would not only make every match more entertaining but give every team a real chance of winning. The 1st RWC incentive would be to be world champions and the 2nd RWC incentive is to not only win the 2nd RWC but get promoted into the 1st RWC.
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I don't believe being thrashed and humiliated by another team that is vastly superior in every aspect of the game is beneficial to either team. They already know before they play that they're inferior and the massive lop sided result just confirms that. What do they do in their post mortem: Right guys we need to vastly improve our set piece, our running game, our lineout, our kicking game, our passing skills, our defence, our attack, our tackling, our goal kicking, our dicipline, our scrum, our fitness to try and keep up with them etc etc.
As I said they already knew than before they played.
It must be extremely difficult to improve when your being constantly pounded for 80 minutes. Better to play that 80 minutes on a level playing field where you can put everything you've planned into practice... have the thrill of scoring tries... kicking penalties...winning lineouts and have a huge driving incentive to win the game...possibly win your pool or be one of the two teams to get to the Quarter finals...then on to the semis and hopefully the finals and the ultimate goal to be promoted into the first tier competition.
Every match is a realistic bench mark to improve their game.
Yes we should be including the second tier nations alot more and grow the game globally but this current RWC model is not the way to do that IMO. Six minnows make the tournament instead of sixteen. Far better to grow the game with sixteen developing teams competing in the same RWC as the first tier... rubbing shoulders with them...playing in the same stadiums and being included as part of the global rugby family.
So they go home and say they played against the mighty Springboks. How did it go? Well we got totally manshamed for 80 minutes and they put 80 points on us...a point a minute...it was a great thrill to finally play against them at the start but by full time I really felt like shit as I crawled off the field battered to a pulp like I'd just done 15 rounds with Muhammad Ali. What did you learn? That we were totally out of their league and it was embarrassing experience....seriously...give me a competitive game any day.
Instead what do we have with the current RWC: just to give six minnow nations the buzz to play with the big boys we have to stretch it out to 6 long weeks (instead of four with my suggestion)...watch (or most probably not watch) 20 lop sided boring games and 10 competitive meaningless Minnow games where both teams have no hope of even getting out of their pool.
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I'm only for this if we can relegate both of last night's teams
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I don't think the scores have blown out as much as other RWCs? (although the next couple of AB games may change that)
I do like the suggestion in one of the other threads of having a plate competition like the 7's do. Then the lesser teams have a longer tournament and have more meaningful even matches
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Serious Answer: I like the idea of a plate comp, it seems like a no brainer. But perhaps the economics don't stack up?
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@Kirwan These are just two of the real up sets in the history of the RWC...out of hundreds of boring games.
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@Blackheart said in There should be two RWCs:
@Kirwan These are just two of the real up sets in the history of the RWC...out of hundreds of boring games.
Boring to you maybe. I bet the minnows that get to play the ABs, for example, are pretty stoked to play regardless of the score. I know that the Portugal guy was pretty excited to score a try against the best team in the world a few years back.
RWCs are also about growing the game, your idea would ensure it stays exactly the same.
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@Kirwan There's only 6 minnow teams in this RWC...in my suggestion there would be 16...alot more playing alongside the Tier one teams in the same stadiums...directly involved in the Global rugby family....with the real hope that they could be promoted up.
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@Blackheart said in There should be two RWCs:
@Kirwan These are just two of the real up sets in the history of the RWC...out of hundreds of boring games.
What about you watch just the four or five games you give a shit about ?
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World Rugby does have some things to think about though. There has been a very definite regression from a couple of nations who are World Cup mainstays. The Samoans are a far cry from their 1990s heights, and seem to be getting worse. Given where their players come from, you would think they will continue to regress as their player base become 3rd and 5th generation kiwis and Aussies.
Canada too seem to get worse nearly every cup.
This is countered by the improvement in Georgia and Uraguay (hell, and even Namibia if you remember them from 2003). Not enough is done getting these teams playing top nations and meaningful tests between cups. Even the horribly corrupt FIFA and UEFA do this better than rugby.
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@Blackheart said in There should be two RWCs:
@Kirwan There's only 6 minnow teams in this RWC...in my suggestion there would be 16...alot more playing alongside the Tier one teams in the same stadiums...directly involved in the Global rugby family....with the real hope that they could be promoted up.
Promotion/relegation just makes the top tier stronger IMO. I'd rather have a WC with 24 teams, a fair chance for any of the pool teams to make the top 2, then a plate comp for the rest of the teams running at the same time.
Best of both worlds.
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@Kirwan said in There should be two RWCs:
@Blackheart said in There should be two RWCs:
@Kirwan There's only 6 minnow teams in this RWC...in my suggestion there would be 16...alot more playing alongside the Tier one teams in the same stadiums...directly involved in the Global rugby family....with the real hope that they could be promoted up.
Promotion/relegation just makes the top tier stronger IMO. I'd rather have a WC with 24 teams, a fair chance for any of the pool teams to make the top 2, then a plate comp for the rest of the teams running at the same time.
Best of both worlds.
the only time promotion/relegation worked was when it kept Hawkes in the backblocks of the 2nd division.
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Unless there is a big financial incentive to 'qualify' for Comp A why would a team in Comp get excited about winning and going up? They would go from being winners to being ass raped.
The other point is that currently going to the big tournament in itself is the achievement and brings attention and growth locally. This is much like how when NZ qualifies for the wendyball WC junior enrolments and interest in the game rise.
It is then up to the organisations to take advantage of that and I agree that isn't always done. Not just a minnow issue though. Oz collected a nice windfall hosting in 2003 and managed to spend it on league players. -
@Crucial the Sevens comp tells me Nations are motivated to move up a tier. The US and Kenya are proof of that.
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Promotion/relegation could never work with a comp 4 years apart.
I can't see any reason why they wouldn't do a Plate comp like in 7s. In fact I'm surprised they haven't done it yet.
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I don’t think it would happen, but I wonder if you’d see mid-ranked teams intentionally not try (eg, select weaker sides) against the top teams with a view to not qualify, then try to win the plate? Also, as there is usually one pool of death, the ‘unlucky’ powerful team would then kill everyone through the plate semis and final (eg, England 2015, Someone this time). I could see the clubs jumping up and down if Farrell was injured in that semi and couldn’t play for 9 months.
It’s not that I don’t like the idea, I just don’t thinks it’s quite right; perhaps with a plate and bowl some of that could be dealt with (eg, just a semi and final for each) so that those competitions were done with at the same time as the ‘big’ semis.
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@Crucial The team that wins the final of Tier 2 would be good enough and competitive enough to play in Tier 1...say Japan...they just beat 15 teams at their level...anyway in the current format their getting ass raped already so why not give them a better chance...I'd be interested to read what all the Minnow teams would think of this format.
