New World Rugby rankings don't make for pretty reading for England
The new World Rugby rankings have been released and it's not good news for England.
Eddie Jones' stated goal for the England was to be the number one Test side by the time the 2019 World Cup came along, instead they've dropped to fourth, for the first time in two years.
Things looked promising when England raced to an early 24-3 lead in Johannesburg against the Springboks, but they ended up losing 42-39 to slip to their fourth Test defeat in a row (the loss to the Barbarians is not counted).
Australia are the team to leapfrog England, into third following their 18-9 win over Grand Slam champions Ireland, who remain in second despite the defeat in Brisbane.
In ending Ireland’s 12-match winning run the Wallabies earned 1.07 points and the difference between Joe Schmidt's side and Australia is now down to one and a half points.
And England will have to look over their shoulders as Wales are breathing down their necks too, a win of greater than 20-10 over Argentina in San Juan would have seen Warren Gatland's side go ahead of England, but instead they trail by a mere six-hundredths of a point.
Despite South Africa's win over England they stay seventh, behind Gregor Townsend's Scotland, who beat Canada 48-10 in Edmonton.
Fiji have equalled their best ever World Rugby ranking, they're up to ninth thanks to their narrow 24-22 win over Samoa in the World Rugby Pacific Nations Cup. Argentina's loss to Wales see them slip to 10th.
New Zealand sit top of standings, they trailed France 11-8 at half-time in Auckland, but responded with 44 unanswered points to seal an emphatic victory.
World Cup hosts Japan remain in 11th thanks to their 34-17 win over Italy. Conor O'Shea's side remain 14th behind Georgia and Tonga.
World Rugby Rankings:
1.(1) NEW ZEALAND 93.99
2.(2) IRELAND 88.05
3.(4) AUSTRALIA 86.56
4.(3) ENGLAND 85.19
5.(5) WALES 85.13
6.(6) SCOTLAND 83.83
7.(7) SOUTH AFRICA 83.81
8.(8) FRANCE 79.10
9.(10) FIJI 77.93
10.(9) ARGENTINA 77.54
Latest Comments
What’s new its a common occurrence, just the journos out there expecting a negative spin. The outcome will be beneficial to jordie and Leinster. The home grown lads hav got some experience to step up to and be more competitive, that or spend the 6 months keeping the bench warm.
Go to commentsI’m all for speeding up the game. But can we be certain that the slowness of the game contributed to fans walking out? I’m not so sure. Super rugby largely suffered from most fans only being able to, really, follow the games played in their own time zone. So at least a third of the fan base wasn’t engaged at any point in time. As a Saffer following SA teams in the URC - I now watch virtually every European game played on the weekend. In SR, I wouldn’t be bothered to follow the games being played on the other side of the world, at weird hours, if my team wasn’t playing. I now follow the whole tournament and not just the games in my time zone. Second, with New Zealand teams always winning. It’s like formula one. When one team dominates, people lose interest. After COVID, with SA leaving and Australia dipping in form, SR became an even greater one horse race. Thats why I think Japan’s league needs to get in the mix. The international flavor of those teams could make for a great spectacle. But surely if we believe that shaving seconds off lost time events in rugby is going to draw fans back, we should be shown some figures that supports this idea before we draw any major conclusions. Where are the stats that shows these changes have made that sort of impact? We’ve measured down to the average no. Of seconds per game. Where the measurement of the impact on the fanbase? Does a rugby “fan” who lost interest because of ball in play time suddenly have a revived interest because we’ve saved or brought back into play a matter of seconds or a few minutes each game? I doubt it. I don’t thinks it’s even a noticeable difference to be impactful. The 20 min red card idea. Agreed. Let’s give it a go. But I think it’s fairer that the player sent off is substituted and plays no further part in the game as a consequence.
Go to comments