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Pressure heaped on Eddie Jones as England fans have snapped up massive amount of Japan 2019 tickets
By Online Editors
England supporters are expecting huge things from Eddie Jones’ side if the level of ticket sales for Japan 2019 is anything to go by.
Not since 2003 have the English lifted the World Cup, but they are set to be visiting team with the biggest following when the latest finals start in the Far East in six months’ time.
Nearly a quarter of the 600,000 tickets already purchased by non-Japan based buyers - in excess of 110,000 match tickets - were bought by people based in England who will travel with high hopes that the victory of 16 years ago in Australia can be repeated.
With Rugby World Cup 2019 ticket sales entering their final stages, international fans are set to make up around 33 per cent of total ticket sales of around 1.8 million.
Fans from England, Australia and Ireland make up the top three international ticket purchasers, while USA and The Netherlands are included in top 10.
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The remaining 160 countries comprise a total of 19.7 per cent with fans coming to Japan quite literally from the four corners of the globe, including as far away as Antarctica.
Based on current ticket purchase data from the priority and general sales phases, as well as official travel and hospitality programmes, England fans are expected to make up 23.9 per cent of the foreign fan contingent, followed by Australia with 15.6 per cent and Ireland with 7.9 per cent.
The sixth largest international group will be fans from the USA, with 4.6 per cent, and The Netherlands round off the top 10 list with 2.5 per cent.
Akira Shimazu, CEO of the Japan Rugby World Cup 2019 organising committee, said: "With less than six months to go before Asia’s first Rugby World Cup kicks off in Japan, it’s encouraging to see such an incredible response from international fans.
“While we expected to see large numbers coming from the traditional rugby nations, I’m thrilled that both the USA and The Netherlands are in the top 10 countries of international ticket purchases.
"From the very beginning, we set out to make Rugby World Cup 2019 a truly ground-breaking tournament, so to have such strong interest from fans in rugby’s frontier markets like the USA and The Netherlands, as well as countries like Germany, Spain and Brazil is absolutely wonderful.
“Asian nations are also well represented with more than three per cent of international fans coming from countries neighbouring Japan.”
The next opportunity for fans to purchase tickets begins on 18 May 2019 with first-come-first-served ticket sales resuming.
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we need a damaging 12 that takes 2 men to tackle that will take pressure off the 10 while also creating space for the 10 and 13 . Leicester is the only guy that fits the mould . The next thing is " will he be able to develop a good offload " ? .
for 13 Joey manu has more x factor then reiko and jordie put togeather . he's got one season in japan before he looks to come home . he's a dark horse but his skill set is something the All Blacks don't have . if he comes home and lights up the npc in a game or 2 , id love to see him fast tracked and come off the bench for the All Blacks and thrown into the deep end to see if he can swim . Just to see if he's worth the time and effort to develop further . We all saw how good sualii did for the wallabies and joey manu is just as good as sualii . He's safe under the high ball , a solid defender , has a master offload , and he's fast and strong .
he fits the mould for razor's offload tactics .
Plus reiko and jordie have had the 12 & 13 for how long and I haven't seen anything special from either of them .
Go to commentsRussia has taken their freedom. Dying for nato won't change that.
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