Rugby World Cup 2019
By: Jacob & Ben
In autumn 2019 there was the 7th Rugby World Cup, which didn’t take place in a heart country of Rugby Union. Instead it took place in Japan.
The opening match between host country Japan and Russia took place in the Tokyo Stadium (Capacity: 49,970) at the 20th September 2019. The Final took place at the 2nd November in the International Stadium Yokohama (Capacity: 72,327)
The 48 matches took place in 12 different Stadiums, all over Japan
The all Blacks started as the top Favourite.
During the tournament there were some very surprising results.
For example it was a big shock to the Irish, when Ireland lost 19:12 against Japan.
After that match many Irish rugby fans were very disappointed because Ireland arrived at the world cup with the goal to win the world cup for the first time or to at least pass the quarter-finals. Before that game Ireland was in the 2nd place at the world ranking and Japan just on the 9th place, which is why everybody expected, that Ireland would win against Japan. Before the world Ireland was in 1st place of national ranking, which was the reason why everybody believed in passing the Quarter-Finals this time.
Another example was the convincing victory that New Zealand had over Canada (63:0)
Or when Fiji lost against Uruguay by 27:30
Several Matches were cancelled while the world cup (New Zealand vs Italy; England vs France and Namibia vs Canada), because of a Typhoon called Hagibis, which was the biggest storm that hit Japan in the last 60 years. These matches ended in a draw, because there was no Plan B for a case like this.
Many places in Japan were flooded or destroyed by the Typhoon, especially the Kanto Region was badly damaged.
It was a small upset, when Japan managed to pass Scotland to go to the quarter-finals.
Ireland was going to play against the big favourite New Zealand in Quarter-finals. It looks like Ireland still wouldn’t pass the quarter-finals, after the shocking loss against Japan, which was really disappointing for everybody who would like to see Ireland as the world cup winner.
After that game Ireland went in the world ranking down to 5th place while. So all in all it was a huge disappointment, because while the world cup was taking place, Ireland went from 1st Position in national ranking to the 5th position and was in national ranking below the big rival England.
The other quarter-finals were England vs Australia; Wales vs France; Japan vs South Africa.
The predictions were that New Zealand would beat Ireland, Australia would beat England, Wales would win against France and South Africa would beat Japan.
The Quarter-finals results were almost as suspected, except of the match England vs Australia, where England was able to beat Australia with a convincing victory of 40:16, in favour of England. As suspected Wales bet France with a close victory of 20:19 and South-Africa threw Japan with a big win of 26:3. Also Ireland lost against New Zealand by 46:14 which was a very disappointing result for the Irish fans.
Because of this results the semi-finals were England vs New Zealand and Wales vs South Africa. The predictions are that England would lose against the all blacks, although it could be a close game. It could also be a close game between South-Africa, in which South-Africa would probably win.