The following four fixtures will be shown on the World Rugby site, and they will be available to watch afterwards, so even the most fevered rugby fans will not be found wanting for action.
Saturday, 20th November
Brazil v Kenya: (3rd/4th place play-off Stellenbosch Challenge, Men’s) Markotter Field, Stellenbosch – 10:00 GMT)
Zimbabwe v Namibia: (Final Stellenbosch Challenge, Men’s) Markotter Field, Stellenbosch – 12:00 GMT)
Russia v Chile: (Men’s) Yug Sports Stadium, Sochi – 12:00 GMT
Georgia v Fiji: (Men’s) Estadio El Deleite, Aranjuez – 14:30 GMT
Now on to the main attractions.
Italy vs Uruguay
Uruguay have qualified for RWC ’23 as Americas 1; however, they fell to Romania last week. Italy did better than most commentators thought they would against the might of the All Blacks but a loss against Argentina will mean they will be looking to make amends. Italy are currently ranked 14 against Uruguay’s 17. The visitors will not be overawed, but I expect the home team to win.
Scotland vs Japan
Scotland were overpowered last week by a very good Springbok side. It would have been understandable if many of those players were stood down, but Toonie has gone for a strong selection as he welcomes Scott Cummings back into the second row. There is rotation on the loosehead side with Schoeman and Bhatti swapping the starting jersey, and there will be new caps: the large shape of Scarlets’ Javan Sebastian, and Dylan Richardson from the Sharks (not the Sale ones) débuting in the back row.
Japan haven’t had the best results, losing heavily in Dublin and beating Portugal by 13, suggesting that this is not the Japan of the last RWC.
Scotland to win.
England v South Africa
South Africa will be after a full house from their three fixtures in November. They have selected a strong side: you know what’s coming, it’s dealing with it that is the problem.
Rodd, Blamire (Blay-mire), Sinckler, Dolly, Marler and Stuart will be under the microscope: it’s a well-known fact of life that you don’t out-Bok the Boks, so unless England can run South Africa around and keep away from set pieces, one would think this is only going to go one way, which is counter-intuitive when talking about England.
Elsewhere, Marcus Smith will be looking to sprinkle a bit of fairy dust on the Battle of the Orcs going on in front of him; he can turn his own Orc outside him in the formidable shape of Manu Tuilagi.
On the other hand, De Allende and Am are a very good midfield partnership; this is a tough game to call because Twickenham is a difficult place to go to play rugby.
I’m going to go for a very tight away win here, less than 7. Unless England’s pack end up as roadkill, like Scotland’s, then it will be a bigger margin: the Boks will be well up for this.
Wales vs Australia
Wales have had a mixed series. Putting out a B team against New Zealanders is never a good idea, but their hand was forced due to the international window agreements. They were five points short of South Africa and overcame the all-singing and -dancing (and big-hitting) Fijians.
Australia have had also had a mixed run of results. After downing the World Champions as a highlight of their year, they beat Argentina twice but lost to Scotland and were thumped by England.
Tupo being back will help their scrum, but they will be without skipper and talisman Michael Hooper, which kind of cancels out AWJ missing from the Welsh boilerhouse.
Wales at home is never a team to bet against, even with a relatively unfamiliar midfield.
Another tough call, but I’m going for a home win here.
France vs New Zealand
New Zealand don’t often lose two in a row. They did last year, but it’s only happened five times since 2000 in around 250 tests (I was surprised at how many they’d played, but then they do tend to play almost all the games possible at the world cup as well as the RC and tours).
Fabien Galthié has chosen partnerships for this match: Dupont and Ntamack at half-back, and Danty joining his erstwhile colleague Fickou in the midfield, which means Jalibert drops to the bench.
Elsewhere there are changes with Mauvaka coming in to the front row with Willemse joining Woki in the locking positions
Is this rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic?
I don’t think the current iteration of the All Blacks present as insurmountable a problem as before, but they are still the All Blacks.
The ABs side hasn’t been announced yet, so just for fun I’ll call this a draw.
Ireland v Argentina
Ireland were HUGE last week: a top-end performance full of fire, commitment, cool heads in the heat of the battle, and extraordinary focus. That is what it takes to beat the top teams, and Ireland had it all.
Can they back it up this week?
At the time of writing the teams have not been published, but everything points to a home win. For me, they have been the most impressive team over the series so far, and the only problem they may face is injuries, which will only serve to open the door for more Leinster players to make the step up to international level, the gits.
A comfortable home win.
Thanks to Tichtheid2 for the preview.
Onna telly this week
Friday 19th November
| London Irish v Saracens | 19:45 | BT Sport 2 |
Saturday 20th November
| Italy v Uruguay | 13:00 | Prime |
| Scotland v Japan | 13:00 | Prime |
| Ireland v Japan (women) | 15:00 | RTÉ2 |
| England v South Africa | 15:15 | Prime |
| Wales v Australia | 17:30 | Prime |
| France v New Zealand | 20:00 | Prime |
Sunday 21st November
| Ireland v Argentina | 14:15 | Channel 4 / RTÉ2 | ||
| England v USA (women) | 14:45 | BBC2 / iPlayer | ||
| Wales v Canada (women) | 17:00 | BBC2 Wales |
Ovally Balls 
Well that sort of half did the trick with them getting it back to 1-1 which is where it finished. Important not to lose to that lot as it means they still don’t have a win and that should have been their easiest fixture of the season. Disappointing not to win after the red card, but from the bits I caught on the radio it sounded like we didn’t deserve to.
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Pukki’s goal was excellent. Norwich brought another striker on and had most of the chances after they equalised. Newcastle (surprisingly) defended fairly well. Draw probably fair – and probably of no use to either team.
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“probably of no use to either team”
Steady on. It’s got us into double figures for points for the season which didn’t look likely a few weeks ago.
We’re not actually that far behind the field and are ahead of Newcastle and Burnley for now…
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@Ticht – it’s seldom that Marina Hyde has an off day, but this was a particularly good article! You could sense the relish with which she laid into the anti-vaxxers and corrupt Tories.
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Indeed, Deebee, and I agree with everything she says there.
I’m afraid I have more Deebee displeasing news, though.
I hear Marc Morrison has been selected for the Scotland U20s squad. I believe he was in the Golden Lions squad previously, a South African fan described him as “the best flyhalf in our u21 provincial competition last year”.
He has a Scottish dad and the story goes that he wasn’t offered a contract in South Africa so he came over to Edinburgh to play for Watsonians. He really caught my eye during the Super 6 competition for two reasons, one he is really tall and skinny, two he has a beautiful pass and reads the game well – good kicking game too.
He got a start early because the Watsons skipper was injured right at the beginning of the season, but he took his chance.
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If it’s the same guy, a blond outside half, I think he’d be too old for the Under 20s, ticht. He was in the Lions Craven Week team in 2017. He got called up for Scotland once before.
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Yeah it’s weird, maybe the guy I read was using old news, Morrison is 22 according to the Watsons site.
At that age he’s still skinny, if he had been young enough for the U20s he would have been very impressive, at 22 he’s probably less likely to make the step up to full time pro.
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A bit of looking suggests that the Lions fancied Jordan Hendrikse, who’s a couple of years younger than Morrison, more as an outside half so awarded him a contract for 2021. JH is the younger brother of Jaden, the Sharks scrum half and Springbok.
No doubt Morrison’s a good player but South Africa produces loads of good players. Look out for Louis Koen (junior) from Paarl Gim and Jean (son of Franco) Smith from this year’s schoolboys.
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If Morrison was the business he would be training with Edinburgh, as the top picks from the Super 6 sides are. I don’t think he has been doing that, or at least not to my knowledge.
Embra have two young lads who play ten in Charlie Savala and Nathan Chamberlain, but having said that, Blair Kinghorn looks to be where we are pinning our hopes, he is looking better every week at fly half. He’s still only 24 with over 100 appearances for Edinburgh under his belt.
Watch Jaco VdW get selected this week now.
The Edinburgh player to watch out for is Matt Currie, outside centre, 20 years old, great distribution, pace, eye for a break, good defence
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Something I really hate is wankers talking during a gig, if they want to talk, do it elsewhere.
Christie knows how to deal with it
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Christy, even.
Bit of Glaswegian spelling there
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Alles wird gut, wenn
Wir einfach weiterrugbyspielen, als seien wir
Zweiundzwanzig
Zweiundzwanzig
As Taylor Swift might say. If she preferred playing rugby to dancing and wanted to talk about it in German.
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The Eldest is off school with Covid and the German teacher is more thorough when it comes to putting stuff on Google Classroom than some of the others, So lots of German this week and today it’s numbers. And suddenly I find myself with the help of the internet teaching her to sing her favourite songs in dodgy German. The times we live in.
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“Glaswegian spelling”
We’ll do the lesson on that tomorrow when Mrs CMW’s not at work. And then ‘Other forms of threatening behaviour’ on Friday.
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On this day:
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Pretty sure I’d mankad if the situation ever arose.
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*makes mental note to mankad Craigs if the situation ever arises*
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*makes mental note to mankad CMW if the situation ever arises*
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I assumed that was covered by your general commitment.
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Yeah but I’ll be even more watchful.
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For greater satisfaction I might have to use other devious ways of getting Craigs out that he doesn’t know about.
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Nah, I’ll score hundreds
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I was on holiday in Colombia on that day, Craigs. Watched quite a lot of Wales v Australia when I should have been swimming in the Caribbean. And to make a bad worse I found out the score of that England-NZ later on.
Am sure that England must have crushed all-comers in the following Six Nations and the subsequent World Cup.
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@cmw
Just bring my lads along. They’re brutal – really enjoy hurting people.
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RIP Ray Kennedy. He was from the glorious Liverpool side I started following as a lad. Time, eh? Spares none of us. And on that note, 90 minutes can seem like a lifetime, as the poor Latvian women found out last night!
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ticht, the Golden Lions have a fair few good rugby schools and looking at their Craven Week teams from 2012 to 2018 5 of the starting outside halves from those 7 teams, if we include Morrison, have gone on to play pro rugby – 4 of them in the UK now.
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Ray Kennedy – the conversion from centre-forward to midfeld was a master-stroke. My memory is that after the initial euphoria with the Arsenal double-winning teams – he’d lost his way a bit. I don’t recall huge uproar when he moved.
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Tam, according to the same source, so pinch of salt until Googled, Morrison went to King Edward VII school, as did ” Bryan Habana, Malcolm Marx and ex Protea captain Graeme Smith”
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On this day:
* Rosa Parks ignites bus boycott
* Channel Tunnel makes it’s breakthrough
* Antarctica is made a military-free continent
* Abraham Lincoln delivers the State of the Union Address
* Henry Ford starts the first moving vehicle assembly line
* AIDS virus officially recognised
* Benazir Bhutto becomes the first woman elected to lead a Muslim state
And what do we get? England beating an out of sorts New Zealand rendered virtually immobile by the norovirus. Or the ref, or whatever it was.
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ticht, that’s right. Joe van Niekerk and the commentator Hugh Bladen as well. It’s a well-known school, very strong in cricket as well. Not as good at rowing as Deebee’s alma mater.
It’s a Milner school, set up after the South African War of 1899-1902 by Alfred, Lord Milner, and his boys who ran the country in those days. Grammar schools would be the equivalent in the UK – but with really good facilities. Pretoria Boys High – John Smit plus others – is another one. Really tip-top for sportspeople and academics.
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Ticht, King Edwards, or KES, as they’re known, have produced some excellent rugby players and cricketers over the years and are always a top school in the Jo’burg derbies. Joe van Niekerk is another who went to KES and I think Scarra Ntubeni as well.
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Scarra’s from King Williams Town and went to Dale but KES got the Dale coach after Scarra’s Under 16 season and he followed the coach to KES. The coach is Carl Spilhaus, who’s now at Jeppe last I heard. His sides play nice rugby.
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@OT – I’m thinking maybe ‘handled the ball’ as was (‘obstructing the field’ now) if he picks it up to give it to a fielder after blocking it at his feet, something like that. Don’t tell him though.
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I was on holiday in Colombia on that day, Craigs. Watched quite a lot of Wales v Australia when I should have been swimming in the Caribbean.
Sounds terrible.
And to make a bad worse I found out the score of that England-NZ later on.
Apparently they announced the result in the Millenium Satdium as fans were leaving. Which is fucking inspired if you ask me.
Am sure that England must have crushed all-comers in the following Six Nations and the subsequent World Cup.
I hadn’t actually appreciated that it was the year my dad was born when Wales last beat the the bawsax.
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Priorities Deebs
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@TomP – Scarra moved to KES for the last two years of his schooling, finishing at KES. Nice story about him and Siya Kolisi here:
https://www.sarugbymag.co.za/siya-eyes-scarra-1/
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@cmw
That’s a nasty one. It’s the kind of trick some of the more streetwise u9s teams round here would pull.
Need my lads to soften him up with a few blows to the front elbow first.
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“Mr Tobie Titus”
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“I hadn’t actually appreciated that it was the year my dad was born when Wales last beat the the bawsax.”
More recent than Lincoln or Ford so not too much to worry about.
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Dale’s a great producer of talent. The Hendrickse boys went to the junior school there before going to Glenwood in Durban. Salese Nohamba the same before going to Durban High. Aphelele Fassi and Rabz Maxwane at the high school, Druggy Dyantyi as well.
A guy I know in Pretoria lived in KWT for a while and was at Dale Junior with Nic Groom, Edinburgh legend. Groom ended up in Rondebosch in Cape Town for his high schooling.
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I know a guy here who was expelled for his high schooling. Good shit it was too.
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@tomp
Lisa Stanfield, Gracie Fields, Rob Rawlinson
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Tremendous sailors and windsurfers all three.
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Handre Pollard to join Leicester Tigers – to replace George Ford
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Christmas is coming. Order now:
cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0554/7625/6959/products/c_576x768.jpg
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@tomp
I might buy 2 and put them on my driveway. After all Bobby Ball used to have a couple of stone lions on his drive.
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They’re not very big. Buy 10.
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I think if there is sufficient demand then much bigger ones will become available.
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I’ll just buy 2 and put a powerful magnifying glass over both of them.
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