Formed 2004 ... Herts 7s U14 Runners-up 2005 ... North Herts U14 team, Herts Youth Games 2005 runners-up (coached by Letchworth)... Herts Superteams U14 Runners-up 2005 ... Herts SuperTeams "Fairplay" winners 2006 ... Rochford 10s U17 Champions 2006 ... East Midlands 10s U17 Runners-up 2007 ... East Midlands 10s U17 "Fairplay" winners 2007 ... National 10s U17 5th place and "Fairplay" winners 2007 ... Herts 7s U17 Plate runners-up 2007 ... National 7s U17 Plate winners 2007 ... RFU "President's XV" Award winners 2007 ... Herts Superteams winners 2007 ... Midlands 10s U18 Runners-up 2008 ... National 10s U18 4th place 2008 ... North Herts U11 team, Herts Youth Games 2008 runners-up (coached by Letchworth girls) ... London and SE 7s U18 Plate runners-up 2008 ... Herts 7s U18s runners-up 2008 ... National 7s U18s quarter-finalists 2008 ... Gloucester City 10s U18 Bowl runner-up (6th) 2009 ... Worthing 10s U18 Plate runner-up 2009 ... National 7s U18 Plate winners 2009... Worthing 10s U15 Plate winners 2010... Worthing 10s U18 Shield winners 2010... Herts 7s U15 and U18 Bowl runners-up 2010... National 7s U18 Plate runners-up 2010...

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

World Cup draw announced

The draw for next year's World Cup has been released by the IRB:

Pool A: New Zealand, Wales, Australia, South Africa
Pool B: England, USA, Ireland, Kazakhstan
Pool C: France, Canada, Scotland, Sweden

So - England will take on the USA, Ireland and Kazakhstan for a place in the final stages?

Well, no. Possibly not. Crucially the actual format for the tournament has not yet been published, but whatever the IRB come up with it can safely be assumed that it will be nothing like as simple as that. Despite one or two media organisations leaping to this conclusion (such as the BBC - though it is nice to see them acknowledge that the game exists after all!), no IRB-organised world cup has ever been that simple. In fact, if the same format as 2006 world cup is used then it would mean that the teams that England will definately not play would be USA, Ireland and Kazakhstan!

So at this stage information about which pool any team has been drawn is actually pretty meaningless - what is rather more important is what this tells us about seedings, which appear to be:

1. New Zealand; 2. England; 3. France; 4. Canada; 5. USA; 6. Wales
7. Australia; 8. Ireland; 9. Scotland; 10. Sweden; 11. Kazakhstan; 12. South Africa

No team from the bottom half of the seeds has ever beaten a team in the top half - so it looks a tough draw for Australia and Ireland.

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