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The dominant image of the official ceremony for the 2011 Rugby World Cup draw was a photo of a confident Richie McCaw, who is robed in a cloak of a Maori chief, striding into New Zealand’s Giant Rugby Ball facility in the heart of London, with a clocked Maori female dignitary on one side and a bald, stocky Jock Hobbes, wearing his NZRU tie, beside him.
Behind this leading group is the winning captain of the 2007 RWC tournament in France, John Smit, in his Springboks blazer, Stirling Mortlock, relaxed with his hand in his pocket and wearing the bemused look of someone who has gone through all this ritual before, and several other national captains.
After the chairman of the IRB Bernard Lapasset drew out the list of countries for the draw, a IRB media release was issued to newspapers and rugby journalists around the world in three languages, English, French and Spanish.
The ‘story’ in the media release was that South Africa was in “arguably the toughest pool,” where they play Fiji “who nearly derailed their charge to the title in 2007” and the 2008 Six Nations champions Wales.
The tournament hosts, the media release stated. “will be looking to avenge their RWC 2007 quarter final exit at the hands of France” with the two sides meeting in Pool A, while England “meet long time rivals Scotland” for the first time in the pool stages play and Australia, RWC champions in 1991 and 1999, face three European teams in Pool C, headed by Ireland and Italy.
The Australian media immediately made the claim that “the Wallabies have received the best draw imaginable.”
If results go according to plan (a big ‘if’ given the upsets in the 2007 RWC), the Wallabies will not run into the world champion Springboks or the top-ranked All Blacks until the final.
Wales should be their quarter-final opponents, Argentina or France in the semi-final, and then either South Africa or New Zealand in the final.
Ireland’s coach Declan Kidney expressed relief that his team had avoided “the kiss of death pool” which sank their hopes in the 2007 RWC. Brian O’Driscoll, Ireland’s captain, warned that Georgia and Romania would come hard at Ireland: “It’s hard to play against any side in a World Cup. I learnt that in 2007. No team makes up the numbers. They come to win.”
The Australian commentary also made the point that South Africa and New Zealand won’t be happy with their draw as they face the prospect of a semi-final against each other, and pool matches against France for New Zealand and Wales for South Africa.
This analysis is flawed.
With France being a bogey team for the All Blacks in the 1999 and 2007 RWC tournaments (and France in 1987), New Zealand would be happy to play Les Bleus in a pool round where the result isn’t a matter of staying in the tournament or not.
As Richie McCaw noted: “I quess there will be a bit of talk about the history between New Zealand and France at World Cups … Quarter finals are tough, as we found in 2007. Anything can happen in the play-off stages.”
Similarly, the Springboks are happy to play Wales in a pool round rather than in the knock-out finals stage of the tournament. John Smit, in fact, made the point that the tough pool the Springboks were in (with Fiji and Samoa as a two other difficult opponents) was “ideal preparation to battle harden the team” for the later stages of the tournament, if they progressed through.
This is what happened, Smit insisted, in the 2007 RWC.
Warren Gatland, the coach of Wales, endorsed Smit’s call on Pool D being “the toughest pool,” which he welcomed. “It is a great draw,” he said. “Look at the World Cup in 2007 – the winner came from the toughest pool.”
Frank Hadden, Scotland’s coach, was adamant that his team had been given “every chance” of reaching the finals after being paired with Argentina and England. He was relieved not to be facing one of the Tri-Nations teams.
England, too, were relieved that their poor run of form was not marked by having to play one of the Tri-Nations sides. The English media interpreted the draw as “much needed positive news after a difficult autumn.”
To my mind, most of this ‘analysis,’ which I’ve indulged in quite enthusiastically in past tournaments, is an exercise in trying to do the impossible and accurately predict the future.
There are four distinct phases to a Rugby World Cup tournament.
The first phase is the Phony War period when the draw is announced and the tournament is yet to start.
This phase is marked by enjoyable but ultimately meaningless chatter about “pools of death” and likely outcomes in the various pool matches. As not a kick has been fired in anger yet, and we have no real idea how precise the preparation of each side has been, the chatter is based on speculation rather than any reality.
No one had any idea, for instance, in the 2007 RWC that Ireland had botched their preparation for the tournament and never really looked like being contenders for anything, despite the fact that the team was highly-rated.
The second phase involves the pool rounds, which for the strong teams amounts to the Opening Skirmishes of the World Cup battle.
Because teams can drop games in the pool round and survive, not too much pressure is placed on the strong sides and the outcomes of their matches. The news they convey to the other teams can be deceptive.
In 1993, for instance, England lost the opening match of the RWC tournament to New Zealand but went through to the Final where they gave Australia a tough game.
In 2007, France lost the opening game of the tournament to Argentina and went on to put New Zealand out of the tournament in the Quarter-Final.
France lost to England in the Semi-Final of the 2007 RWC, despite the fact that England had been thrashed by South Africa in a pool round match.
The Quarter-Finals and the Semi-Finals resemble the Set Piece Battles before the final push.
The Final is the Decisive Battle to establish the winner of the tournament, which is not the same as being the best team in the tournament.
In my view, the Set Piece Battles phase and Decisive Battle final phase are where the RWC contest becomes the real thing. And we are not going to find out the outcomes of these phases until they happen.
But we can be certain of one thing: the outcome will be different from what the conventional wisdom leading up to the 2011 RWC says will happen.
In other words, there is a big difference between the RWC mind games and real games played out in the finals.
Vive la difference!