Live blog: World Rugby U20 Championship 2024 in Cape Town – Day One

It was 15 weeks ago, when the age-grade Six Nations finished in a welter of excitement in Cork and Pau that the appetite was well and truly whetted for the 2024 World Rugby U20 Championship.

Ireland finished their campaign unbeaten but that wasn’t enough to deny England the title as a swashbuckling victory away to France came with the four try bonus point crowned them as champions.

The anticipation was then further heightened with the inaugural staging of the first age-grade Rugby Championship, New Zealand stealing a march on their southern hemisphere rivals to clinch the title seven weeks ago on the Australian Gold Coast.

Five of the Six Nations countries and all four Rugby Championship participants are now in South Africa along with Georgia, Spain and Fiji and the six-match round one programme will see a feast of rugby.

The schedule at the iconic DHL Stadium is defending champions France versus Spain at 2pm local time followed by Ireland versus Italy (4.30pm) and hosts South Africa against Fiji (7pm).

Out the road in the Cape Flats, the three-match programme begins with England versus Argentina (2pm) with Australia-Georgia (4.30pm) and Wales-New Zealand (7pm).

The day will begin for RugbyPass with the cross-hemisphere England-Argentina game in Athlone before we head into the Mother City for the Ireland-Italy and South Africa-Fiji fixtures.

Rugby fans around the world can watch the action live for free on RugbyPass TV in countries that don’t have an exclusive host country broadcaster. Click here to sign up to stream the games and keep an eye below for exclusive interviews, behind the scenes footage and all the other opening day developments on the RugbyPass live blog: