how do you think the British Isles as a rughby union international team would fare at the world cup?
in view of the lions performance how do you think that a British Isles team would fare (minus the Irish players) at a world cup if they played together regularly
Well I presume you mean an established team from the four home nations which practises and plays together on a continuous basis — not a through-together, six-weeks-once-every-four-years squad like the Lions.
If that is the case, they would do very well — the population base alone — 70 to 80 million puts the SH nations at a serious disadvantage. They would have no difficulty defeating Australia on a regular basis.
The only fly in the ointment is that association football is still the number one sport in England and Scotland. Rugby would have to split that pool of athletes with soccer. In New Zealand and South Africa, rugby gets first pick (just like gridiron in America, ice hockey in Canada, or soccer in Argentina) of the most talented athletes. That would give them an edge which would allow them to stay competitive with your hypothetical British/Irish squad.
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Still wouldn’t beat New Zealand, Australia, South Africa or maybe France.
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If they spent time together as a proper team they would have the potential to win the RWC every time. Imagine the overachieving England team of 2007 which lost the final to the Boks by 9 points, if they had O’Driscoll, Phillips, O’Connell, Byrne etc! As for the previous post that says they might have trouble beating even France, they have enough trouble winning the 6 Nations, let alone beating the best payers on one team! I for one would love to see this format happen
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Ireland is part of the British Isles (not United Kingdom or Great Britain) so why would you leave them out?
On the evidence of the past few weeks in South Africa where we witnessed a scratch team with limited preparation match up to the current World Champions, the answer would have to be – pretty well!
That however included a major contribution from a sizeable Irish contingent so their absence from your hypothetical "British Isles" team would weaken the team somewhat and lessen their chances of success.
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that would b equal to an expanded Oceanic team .the best of Aussie,NZ & the Islands… wat a team , almost unbeatable by any single nation .. a larger pool to get the better players from must equal a better team …the same with the British Isles … Our leveller is their limitted time together to gain cohesion
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They may do better than England or Wales by themselves, but it would destroy the game in Britain. The pinnacle of someones career is to make the WC team for their country and if the Lions replaced that then their chances would drop (particularly in Scotland) by over 60%. Why would you try then unless you had a real chance.
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given the chance to train together more and play more matches together, and basically get to know each other and their playing style a lot more, they’d definetely be able to win the whole thing
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September 20th, 2009 at 5:19 am
Well I presume you mean an established team from the four home nations which practises and plays together on a continuous basis — not a through-together, six-weeks-once-every-four-years squad like the Lions.
If that is the case, they would do very well — the population base alone — 70 to 80 million puts the SH nations at a serious disadvantage. They would have no difficulty defeating Australia on a regular basis.
The only fly in the ointment is that association football is still the number one sport in England and Scotland. Rugby would have to split that pool of athletes with soccer. In New Zealand and South Africa, rugby gets first pick (just like gridiron in America, ice hockey in Canada, or soccer in Argentina) of the most talented athletes. That would give them an edge which would allow them to stay competitive with your hypothetical British/Irish squad.
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