Wales vs Canada 1993

The recently crowned Grand Slam Champions of Europe, Wales were one team that was defeated at the hands of Canada in the 1990´s. Canadian rugby was on a high in the latter stages of the days of amateurism and backed up its appearance at the Quarter Finals stage of Rugby World Cup 1991 with some impressive results in the following years. In Rugby World Cup 1991 Canada had impressed in defeating Fiji and Romania and gave France a good match before losing. It was, nevertheless, enough to advance and Canada faced New Zealand in the Quarter Finals, giving the All Blacks a good run for their money. Rugby purists the world over are well aware of Canada´s appearance at the Quarter Finals stage and it is used as a marker to show that Canada is a proud rugby country that has achieved on the greatest stage of them all. 

Al Charron, RWC 2003 Captain

Canada´s biggest accomplishments, possibly of all time, were not in 1991, however. Rather, the year 1993 is one which to this day has been Canada´s finest hour. Canada hosted England while the Lions were touring New Zealand and as such, the RFU requested that the match not be termed an international and had England play under the name of England XV. It was, in effect, a strategy utilized to make it a win-win situation for England. Should England lose they could blame it on the Lions and claim it was just a training match. A win, in contrast, would be a way of saying England´s depth is strong and formidable. The cover that this provided worked out in England´s favor as Canada´s 15-12 win at Burnaby Lake has gone down in history as being a non-international. Latter that year, Canada were not denied a famous win on a techinicality, however as Wales defeated Wales 26-24 in Cardiff thanks to a late try to Al Charron to claim what, to this day, remains Canada´s greatest triumph. The match took place at the venue that has since been upgraded and renamed as the Millenium Stadium. Not only did Canada win in Wales but the home side was unable to score a try with Neil Jenkins´ boot being responsible for all of the Welsh points. 

Gareth Rees, RWC 1995 / 1999 Captain

The following year, Canada continued to impress with the North Americans completing an 18-16 home victory in Nepean over France with IRB Hall of Famer, Gareth Rees kicking the Canadians to victory. During this period, Canada was also significantly better than its North American counterpart, the USA with Canada regularly winning the matches and doing so by comfortable margins. Canada was also too strong for Japan and completed a good 22-10 win over Fiji in Nadi in 1995. Being drawn with both Australia and South Africa at Rugby World Cup 1995 meant Canada´s chances of advancing to the Quarter Finals were extremely difficult and this proved to be the reality despite Canada giving both teams strong matches. From there things became tougher and tougher for Canada as the advent of professional rugby lifted the level of all teams who exposed their players to professionalism. Canada missed the boat and it has proven to have held back the development of the country´s national team. Fiji, with players involved in Super Rugby and elsewhere completed a 38-22 win over Canada during Rugby World Cup 1999. Canada then went on to  crush Namibia 72-11. Had Canada won vs Fiji it would have advanced in the tournament. 

The 2015 World Cup qualification set to get underway with Mexico taking on Jamaica in the opening match

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The first match of 2015 Rugby World Cup qualification gets underway this Saturday as Mexico (IRB ranking 71) take on Jamaica (IRB ranking 86).

Despite neither team having any chance of being one of the eight qualifiers from the 80 nations competing for a place at 2015, the match being staged in Mexico City is set to receive a lot more media attention than normal and hopefully to the benefit of Mexican rugby.

This is Mexico's first attempt at World Cup qualification, they have 1421 registered adult male players (more than four time World Cup nation Namibia) and only just entered the IRB rankings last week (along with Pakistan and the Philippines) despite being a full IRB member since 2006. Their coach is their number 8 Simón Pierre, who is from New Zealand.

Meanwhile the Caribbean side Jamaica who have far less players just 376 registered adult males, famous for sprinters and cricket will embark on their fourth World Cup qualifying campaign. Despite less players, they have more rugby pedigree than their opponents and even had a side in the 2008 Junior World Trophy tournament. Winger Marcel Garvey, is of Jamaican parentage but is unable to play unfortunately as he has represented England A. 

The Webb Ellis Cup

The match will be attended by England's legendary number 8 Lawrence Dallaglio a World Cup winner in 2003 and the 2015 World Cup ambassador. Dallaglio will present both teams with their matchday shirts which should be a memorable moment for the players who are all very much at an amateur level.

The match will be refereed by world class ref Craig Joubert who took charge of the World Cup final in October. And also the Webb Ellis Trophy will be at the match.

The game will be available to watch live on this link at 15:30 local time or 21:30 GMT

IRB World Rankings June Implications

Canada celebrate beating Tonga. Could Canada make the Top Ten?

Following the completion of Europe´s premier international competition, the Six Nations the IRB World Rankings of its participants tell a tale of two cities. There is a clear split between the top four and the bottom two. Champions Wales were undefeated and deserved the title but the teams wins over England and France were Ireland were by small margins and all could have been loses. Results against Italy and Scotland were clearer with bigger wins not only from Wales but from the other three teams. It is a continuation of a long term trend in which Scotland have been falling behind while Ireland and Wales have been eliminating the gap between themselves and that of England and Scotland. Italy, in contrast to Scotland, have been improving and the evidence on the international stage as well as within Italian rugby seems to underline the progress of the sport in the country. Scotland, like Italy, are seemingly now a far different prospect at home than in away matches. While the other four are able to perform well home and away.

Could the USA topple Italy in 2012?

The IRB World Rankings have neither Italy nor Scotland in the World´s Top Ten. Both teams are in fact ranked much closer to Canada than they are to Argentina. Canada ranked 13th in the world with Italy and Scotland in 11th and 12th. The points difference sees Canada less than one point behind Scotland and less than two behind Italy. Scotland are more than six points behind Argentina. The European team ranked closed to both Italy and Scotland (besides eachother) is not a Six Nations participant, but rather, Georgia. Similar to Argentina entering The Rugby Championship, Georgia needs to be integrated into the Six Nations. One thing that the current shape of the World Rankings does show is that the June 2012 tours are set up well with Italy to play Argentina in San Juan, the USA in Houston and Canada in Toronto. Scotland will face Australia, Fiji and Samoa. But these tours are not common, rather a rare thing. Scotland will also host Tonga in November, giving it a good chance of rising in rankings. 

Rupeni Caucau vs Scotland in 2003

Should Scotland end the year outside of the Top Ten then Georgia´s case for a place in the Six Nations would be greatly amplified. The matches against Tier Two sides will enable them to pick up IRB Rankings points, especially because the teams they will face are ranked closely. The lowest ranked side that Scotland will face is Fiji in 17th, the same team that ran riot vs the Scot´s at Rugby World Cup 2003 with Rupeni Caucau breaking the line at will. It took the boot of Chris Paterson to rescue Scotland that day. He has now gone to retirement, however, and Scotland´s goalkicking has suffered. Fiji and Samoa will be no easy games for the Scot´s and it could see the Scot´s appear more like a Tier Two than a Tier One side. Italy, in contrast,  have a tough first match in San Juan and then head north to Toronto and Houston. If Italy´s ambition is to be ranked as highly as possible than Jacques Brunel may well opt to field his strongest team in North America, especially given the schedule of facing Canada on Friday evening, having played Argentina on the previous Saturday some 8,380KM away. 

Both Canada and the USA will also play host to Georgia. Any slip ups from either Scotland or Italy would therefore sink the sides lower than their present rankings. Should Canada replicate the form it showed at Rugby World Cup 2011 it could well win all four tests this June. Such a scenario would see the Canadians move towards the Top Ten and if Scotland fail to win in Fiji and Samoa then Canada could be ranked even higher. The USA´s position of 17th could also change greatly. Should the USA Eagles have success in June then it will rise and further put into dispute the IRB´s distribution of qualification places for Rugby World Cup 2015. The USA is ranked behind all of its opponents for the June internationals which means that wins will be more significant for the Eagles than the Canadians. Curiously, the USA is ranked closer to Chile than it is to Canada. This is a sign of the lack of matches the USA has against lower ranked sides. The opposite is true of Namibia, which explains the Africans position in World Rankings.

The World´s Top 25 also features five countries from the Americas. In other words the Americas make up for 20% of the World´s top 25 teams. Three come from South America and two from North America. South America is the only region to not have automatic qualification granted to the winner of its phase of World Cup qualification. Not only does it go against performances at World Cup´s but it also goes against World Rankings. Rather than solving the issue of African participants, other than South Africa struggling, the IRB opted to continue giving Africa an automatic place with Africa one going directly to in Rugby World Cup 2015 while South America 1 will have to face North America 1 and the loser enter repercharge. The IRB, whether intentional or not, continues to fail to address its special treatment of gifting Africa 1 a place at World Cups. Unlike other regions, it is not a system based on merit. Japan, for instance, are clearly a team who should always be at World Cup´s despite not having won many matches. Both the USA and Canada have won more as has Uruguay yet Namibia has played 24 for zero wins, sits behind Spain in World Rankings and does not have a good record against sides from outside of Africa. 

Current IRB World Rankings

1(1)	New Zealand	91.43
2(2)	Australia	87.99
3(3)	South Africa	84.34
4(4)	England	83.62
5(5)	Wales	83.32
6(6)	France	81.91
7(8)	Argentina	80.28
8(7)	Ireland	79.85
9(9)	Tonga	76.63
10(10)	Samoa	75.81
11(12)	Italy	74.17
12(11)	Scotland	73.86
13(13)	Canada	72.92
14(14)	Japan	70.45
15(15)	Georgia	70.26
16(16)	Fiji	68.78
17(17)	United States	65.63
18(18)	Romania	63.81
19(19)	Spain	62.57
20(20)	Namibia	61.24
21(21)	Uruguay	60.47
22(22)	Russia	60.12
23(23)	Chile	59.52
24(25)	Belgium	58.88
25(24)	Portugal	57.75

For a complete list of IRB World Rankings click here.