Rugby World Cup: Boks in final?
By Guillaume Mahot
After the tragedy caused by typhoon Hagibis (at least 70 dead, 15 missing and 200 injured, without mentioning material damage), Japan was attempting to forget a little thanks to its rugby world cup and its stunning team, the Brave Blossoms, who achieved miracle by beating Ireland and Scotland to reach the quarterfinals of the competition for the first time in their history.
The miracle did not last long still and the experimented (but not only) Springboks were getting the Japanese back to reality with a crushing 3-26 inflicted to the host country last weekend. If Japan can consider this world cup as a success in spite of this ultimate defeat, the story is going on for South Africa, about to meet Wales next Sunday for the second semifinal.
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The Welsh players suffered much more in their quarterfinal with a qualification snatched in the last minutes against France (20-19). Shaken up and perhaps surprised by a French team no one in France was really relying on, Wales got their ticket for the next round by the back door and will be confronted to a radically different form of opposition with Handré Pollard’s team. No doubt that the physical fight will be decisive after many days of competition and a few withdrawals, consequences of the games’ intensity.
The winner of Wales-South Africa will meet either New Zealand or England in final of the 2019 world cup edition. By the way, many consider this semifinal between the All Blacks and the Red rose as a final before the time, where physical strength should prevail as well. These two semifinals will be an interesting assessment of both hemispheres’ forces to see if the North or the South are running the rugby planet in 2019. Will the final be a Six Nations’ one or a Four Nations’ one?
Africa Global News Publication
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