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According to this report in the London Independent, the International Rugby Board isn’t making the upcoming 2011 Rugby World Cup easy on the “Developing Nations.”  While the top tier teams have plenty of time to recover between matches, teams like the U.S., Russia and other “not so important” nations are going to stack up their matches like cordwood, with not as much time to recover.

From the story:

And no shock either that the poor bloody infantry – the likes of Namibia, Georgia, USA and Russia – have again been handed horrendous itineraries. The mathematics of playing in four pools of an uneven number of teams (five) always guarantees someone will have to back up rapidly from match to match, but first-time qualifiers Russia face four Tests in 17 days from 15 September (v USA) to 1 October (v Australia). Namibia face Fiji on 10 September and Samoa four days later, then South Africa on 22 September and Wales on the 26th. The top six established unions all have at least five days between matches. So much for encouraging the very countries in which the World Cup is supposed to be propagating the game.

It’s interesting that the teams with the depth and experience to play matches closer together, those top tier teams such as Australia, England, etc, get more time to recover, while the nations that the International Rugby Board wants to expand into – again the U.S., Russia, Georgia, etc. – get screwed over.

Short answer: No. Unlike the Bills, the All Blacks already have a world championship.

(*Ba, Dum, Crash!* Wokka Wokka)

New Zealand is undoubtedly on top of the world – getting ready to host the World Cup, a sweep in the 2010 Tri Nations Tournament, the All Blacks are ranked #1 in the world by near record ranking levels, the Black Ferns have just won their 19th straight World Cup (or something close to that), and the New Zealand Sevens team is showcasing last year’s Super 14 Rookie of the Year.

Things can’t be better, can they?

But I’m starting to feel the fear, it started around Sept. 9 of this year.  Oddly enough that marked one year until the kick off of the 2011 Rugby World Cup in New Zealand.  Questions started popping into my mind, and if you’re a member of All Black Nation, then you know what I’m talking about – whether you want to admit it or not.

• Are the All Blacks peaking too soon?
• Are they going to maintain this level of play for the next 13 months?
• What will happen on their Northern Hemisphere tour this year?
• Is there another “ill fated” pot of coffee in their future? (see 1995 Rugby World Cup championship conspiracies)
• Is another team going to step up and be able to beat the All Blacks on their home turf?

New Zealand has always been notoriously hard to beat anywhere, but in the Land of the Long White Cloud they are damn near invincible.  Much like the Bills in Super Bowl XXV (sorry Giants fans, but you know it’s true) it turns out you don’t have to be the best team in the tournament to win the championship.

The All Blacks have been among the best teams in rugby for, well seemingly ever. But Fate (or a reasonable facsimile) always seems to jump up and bite them in ass. Their one World Cup championship came back in 1987. To end this by putting that in perspective, I was just starting high school in ’87 – and I’m approaching ancient status. 

The Daily Reflector from… somewhere in North Carolina, has pictures from today’s Eastern North Carolina Wheelchair Rugby Tournament in… somewhere in North Carolina.  Check out the action and the profile pics!  And if you’re interested in Wheelchair Rugby click on over to the U.S. Quad Rugby Association.

Sorry about the delay, took a few days off – working on a future idea for this here site that I hope you’ll like!

Anyway, on to the post!  All Black winger Joe Rokocoko – who readers of the Rugby SuperSite might remember received quite a bit of criticism for his selection on this year’s undefeated New Zealand Tri-Nations team – announced that he has signed on with the New Zealand Rugby Union, and probably sticking with the Auckland Blues in Super Rugby, through their 2011 Rugby World Cup campaign!  This is great news for Rokocoko, a specialist winger playing currently with the Blues.  Congratulations!

(one of the things I’m working on the for the site is an email interview with Rokocoko, who made an impression on me in the first Tri Nations game this year. I’ll keep you updated on how that goes)

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There are only a couple of days left for those rugby photographers to get their pics in to the IRB for the Fifth Annual IRB/Emirates Airline Rugby Photograph of the Year Competition. So far over 200 pictures have been entered in the contest. (Only 200!?There are more entries in the Albuquerque Journal’s yearly “Who Can Take a Hot Air Balloon Picture” contest!)

The winner of the competition will receive a trip for two to the Emirates Airline Dubai Rugby Sevens tournament this year.  And how awesome would a trip to the Dubai Sevens be?

The judges for this year’s competition include Rugby World Editor Paul Morgan, Getty Images photographer Dave Rogers and others who will meet in London later this month to select the winning picture.

How will they select the lucky picture?  Well.. :

The judges will again be looking for a stand out picture that depicts Rugby’s unique blend of qualities, including teamwork, camaraderie, fellowship, skill and fair play. Photographs can be submitted from all levels of the Game, from Test arena action shots and supporters to behind the scenes snapshots or an image of community Rugby life.

Entries for this competition must be received no later than 9 a.m. GMT on Monday, Sept. 13 – which isn’t too much time from now! Get your pictures from this weekend’s matches sorted out, set them up as 300dpi JPEGs and emailed in to photooftheyear@irb.com right away!

According to the International Rugby Board, as quoted in this Stuff.co.nz story, the Haka (the traditional Maori war dance the All Blacks do before each match) in addition to other war dances by the various Pacific Island teams attending the 2011 Rugby World Cup will be respected. During the recently ended 2010 Women’s Rugby World Cup, Australia was fined over $2000 because they got too close to the Black Ferns as they performed the Haka in their pre-match ceremony.

From the story:

The IRB confirmed that the New Zealand haka and the various challenges performed by the Pacific Island nations would be embraced as a key aspect of next year’s World Cup.

While there have been calls from some quarters for the haka to be banned, the IRB believes fans regard the haka as a key feature of any match involving the All Blacks.

As the video accompanying the story points out, there was one nation that was classless enough to ignore the New Zealanders and just huddle up as if nothing was going on.  And I’m sure none of us would be surprised to find out that it was, or course, the French.

And who in the hell would want to ban the Haka? (Probably some Frenchman… it’d figure. 😉 ) It’s one of the most iconic parts of any rugby match involving the All Blacks.  Who can’t watch the 1973 All Blacks vs. Barbarians match and feel the chill run up their spine at the very beginning when New Zealand finishes the Haka? (and that wasn’t an intense Haka at all, compared to today’s performances!)

Probably as a result of the French classlessness, the IRB has “encouraged” that teams stand about ten meters back from the halfway line and face the team’s challenge.  With those teams disregarding this “encouragement” possibly incurring fines.

 

Argentina is moving closer to take what has become their rightful place in the rugby universe, as the junior member of the Tri-Nations competition – potentially in 2012.

Why “junior member” you might ask?  Because Argentina is making a big jump from competition like the IRB Americas Rugby Championship, where they would face the U.S., Canada and Tonga (who is stepping in with an invite) to face off with the three best national teams in the world.  (For measurement, Argentina is ranked #8 in the latest world rankings)

For a quick lesson, let’s look back in time ten or so years…

When Italy joined the then-5 Nations in 2000 they also filled this role, especially facing England and Ireland.  (For those of you who don’t know, the Five Nations at the time consisted of the British Isles national teams, plus France)

One can argue that the experiment has been a failure so far, since the Italians have yet to capture a winning season, much less a Six Nations title – racking up only seven wins against 47 losses. But if you look at the Italians from a more holistic standpoint, they have started presenting a more professional front as a national rugby union, and their play has definitely become much more disciplined as a result of playing these higher profile teams.

Argentina has the opportunity for the same benefit – developing a more professional organization overall, and measuring their potential against the best in the world.  

I remember a few years back, there had been talk about adding the U.S. national team to what was (then ) the Super 12 rugby tournament.  An interesting idea, but the logistics would have sucked – it’s hard enough for the South Africans in the Tri Nations(apparently since they keep threatening to leave SANZAR) and they are in the Southern Hemisphere.  It would be interesting to see the U.S. in the Six Nations, but until they can beat the Canadians and the match up with Argentina, the U.S. has its own problems to address.

By the hair of their chinny-chin-chins, the New Zealand All Blacks completed the clean sweep of the Tri-Nations competition by squeaking by the Australia Wallabies 23-22.

Thanks to late second-half tries by New Zealand captain Richie McCaw and No. 8 Kieran Read, the All Blacks were able to fight back from a 14-6 halftime deficit – which had expanded to 19-6 early in the second half after Australia center Adam Ashley-Cooper was on the receiving end of a pass from scrum half Matt Genia.

This continues the Australian losing streak to their cross Tasman rivals to a record-setting ten games.  While for the All Blacks, this has to give them more confidence going into their 2011 World Cup campaign.

Catch the Scrum.com game stats here!

Later today, Australia will try once more to stop the All Black Tri-Nations onslaught as they face off in Sydney.  It’ll be the last game of the Tri-Nations tournament for the All Blacks, who clinched the Tri-Nations title this year against South Africa at “Soccer City” Stadium.

The only question left to ask is – Can the Australians do it?

Recently the Aussie ended a 45+ year drought of winning any matches at higher altitudes by beating South Africa, and are only making one change to the Wallabies lineup that won that match.  They are now hoping to break another bad streak and keep their current loss streak to the All Blacks in single digits at nine.

Meanwhile, the All Blacks have won every Tri-Nations game this year, what would make this match any different? When they beat Australia in game two of the series (in Christchurch) the Wallabies were playing a strong game, but still unable to knock the Kiwis off of their pedestal. 

According to Scrum.com, the New Zealand player to watch is fly-half Aaron Cruden, who has been pressed into service due to an injury to Dan Carter.  It’s an important game to get your international start in, and his opposite in this match will be Quade Cooper, who is looking to redeem himself after a recent suspension (thanks to his actions on the pitch against South Africa) and debate whether he would leave Rugby Union for the potentially more lucrative paychecks in Rugby League.  This battle at one of the most important positions on the field will be one to watch with interest.

 

Prediction:

My take on this Tri-Nations match – I think the Aussies will put up a good fight, but they’re going to get the short end of the stick, and the All Blacks will live up to their 2/5 favorite status and return to the Land of the Long White Cloud as undefeated Tri-Nations Champions.

 

Note:

A recent financial and time crunch has played havoc on my Tri-Nations reporting, in the next few days there will be updates and my takes on how the tournament has progressed for South Africa and Australia – including the two teams swapping their #2 and #3 world rankings.

According to the dogged work of American Rugby News, USA Rugby is looking at the ever present problem of college athletes moving from program to program looking for greener pastures, or at least different opponents.

From the article (please click the link and read the entire piece):

The issue has now bubbled over to the point where Phillips is calling on USA Rugby to implement rules of engagement and codes of conduct for USAR coaches.

The sticking point is Phillips’ assertion that All-American assistant coach Blake Burdette first had contact with Shephard after the High School championships in Salt Lake City and then had further conversations with him on the 2009 All-American tour to South Africa.

Once again, massive kudos to Brian Lowe and his excellent staff at American Rugby News for staying on top of this story.  At first glance it appears that this is not important to cover, but if rugby wants to be taken as seriously as a collegiate sport then players can’t jump from program to program like they’re NAIA athletes.  Boulder needs to come up with some kind of monitoring program to hold athletes accountable to the programs the decide to play for. 

A side benefit of this kind of program might be to spread the athletic talent to universities based more on the school’s academic program than whether or not they can offer scholarships, or other perks, to players – or whether these teams field All-American coaches as well who have a level of unfair contact with athletes.  Let’s be honest here, there are a handful of collegiate teams that have an unfair advantage by being able to offer rugby-specific scholarships and enticements such as varsity program status (and access to NCAA-caliber facilities).

(Not to mention the ever moving target of when collegiate eligibility runs out – is it after a set amount of time, or can players who have been in and out of college at the whim of their coach (whenever they need them for a season) return to play at anytime)

Interestingly, Todd Bell from USA Rugby commented to Lowe that he had been apprised of the situation as early as this summer.  If that’s true, then my next question is – why did it take a move by Indiana coach Tom Phillips to the media to get some kind of action?