Does rugby need the Nations Championship?

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0:47hello everyone this is the ruck the journalist rugby podcast from the times and the sunday times and welcome one welcome all to three weeks of utter nation's championship madness we're here with England in Johannesburg. You can hear the babbling brook of the swimming pool behind us at our hotel. We've begun our global odyssey following what you now must call the inaugural Nations Championship. Everybody. We'll be here in South Africa, up in Liverpool and over in Argentina giving you three pods a week, Monday, Thursday, Saturday night with our epic team on the ground. And here they are, fresh as daisies, I think.

1:21It's Alex Lowe. Yeah, fresh. Fresh, hello. Hello. Good to be here. And Charlie Morgan.

1:26Charlie Morgan: Less fresh, but raring to go.

1:28Alex Lowe: Yeah, Charlie's landed this morning, Monday. I got in Sunday in time to join Will and a couple of others in a bar to watch the World Cup. Bafana, Bafana against Canada in the World Cup, which is one of those things where I got back to the room and all the football writers who were out at the World Cup were like, oh, thank God that didn't go to extra time. What a turgid game. Such low quality. We were in this bar full of really excitable South Africa fans. And it was low quality, but that seemed to make it. There seemed to be loads of errors and space and chances and last-ditch defending. And we really enjoyed it.

2:00Alex Lowe: It was great fun. And there was some quite wild, mad, crazy defending. And everyone was so engaged in it. It would have been lovely if they'd scored. There was one little tableau which I was like, this is never happening in England. So Canada score in the 92nd minute. Heartbreaker. Lovely goal. The game ends with sort of all the South Africans in the box trying to score. They don't. And the fans in our little cafe bar started clapping. be like well at least they gave it a good go can you imagine that it would have been lovely, they were so excitable they're off their seats all the time, it would have been great to have witnessed a goal for South Africa

2:35Charlie Morgan: it would have gone off, equally wholesome story about that game for me, while we were in midair one of the air hostesses was getting South African air hostesses was getting texts from her mum score updates from her mum and she was not, the passengers that didn't want spoilers she wasn't telling but she was dotting around and updating guys that did want to know

2:55Alex Lowe: And it would have made, last thing on that, would have made Saturday, you'd have gone Springboks England at Ellis Park straight into South Africa World Cup. Well, the kick-off at our time is 5.40 on Saturday for the rugby, and the game they could have got into was at 7pm, so it would have been bang on. It would have been a nightmare if it had clashed, because we were actually thinking, like, are people going to be more engaged in the football than the rugby? That's something we'll probably get onto. They seem to be. But, look, both of you have just come back from... We're already here. You've been here, what, for like seven hours?

3:25I would say less, maybe.

3:27Charlie Morgan: Straight to Razzi. One of two Razzi Erasmus press conferences this week is putting himself up twice, which is a classic flex and just a way for him to set the narrative for the week, which is kind of typical. Really interesting. He actually went even further. In his opening address, he listed out about five questions that he thought could come up from this squad. So, for example, who's covering 10? It's Damien Vilemse. who's starting at fullback, who's covering lock. It's Peter Steff de Toy. Why is Wilco Lode not there instead of Zachary Porthon? Because it's at altitude and he's expecting a mobile England pack.

4:07Charlie Morgan: And then there was a classic sort of pause after he'd done this kind of diatribe and the sort of message was, are we done then? And no, there was another half an hour. We got into a fair bit. A few more straight bats than maybe typical of Erasmus, would you say?

4:22Alex Lowe: Yeah, he was well behaved today. Sometimes you think he's been well behaved, but there's an undercurrent. I didn't feel there was much of an undercurrent today. He's named, even with the injuries that the box have, he's named a pretty formidable looking team. We were obviously asking chiefly England-related questions. He reckons England are going to come and try and play an open game. Having said last week that Steve Borthwick is a guy who coaches by numbers, so I was asking why he feels they'll come, given the pressure they're under, and try and play this open way. He was very polite then about England.

4:55Alex Lowe: and how Saints play and how he'll need to rely on that core and asked him why he thinks South African fans love to hate Henry Pollock which is basically a half-volley outside off stomp if he wants to ramp it up and actually he just said well we only look at him as a rugby player and he's a flipping good rugby player and we don't know him as a character so it would be wrong of us to judge him as a person

5:19Charlie Morgan: we've got to sort of keep in context that Razzie is an Afrikaans speaker and he's fantastic at English for someone who is that but sometimes he sort of goes back and recorrects himself and he said Henry Pollock's teammates probably like him and then he went, no no sorry they do like him they do like him he also said he was sort of lathering this praise on Henry Pollock and he said not only that he's really good physically there's no way he's saying that privately that's where he will want to really test Henry Pollock and that's where Henry Pollock will be tested in this game more than probably any other game he's played so far in his career

5:58Alex Lowe: We do with Razzie like we used to with Eddie where we're looking for what does he actually mean and maybe the one thing he said was that point about Pollock he's really good physically it's probably in Razzie's interest to talk him up rather than to give ammunition to the rest of the South African rugby conversation who are all putting a target on his back to actually talk him up and then put the pressure on him And that way, the box rate you, the box think you're physical, go and show it. And then, as you say, Charlie, behind the scenes, I suspect he's saying to them, wait till he comes at you and teach him a lesson.

6:30And also probably a challenge taking the right way for someone like Jasper Vista being like, this guy's really physical, by the way. I wonder what you're going to do about that. And he's like, come on then.

6:41Charlie Morgan: We've seen what's kind of the add-on to this is we've seen what the Chasing the Sun documentaries were a masterclass in showing how he ramps up players privately. So you've got that in the back of your mind as well when you're sitting in a press conference and when, as you say, he's sort of behaving himself and being very cordial.

7:00Alex Lowe: And the use that they make of every ammunition possible. So a quote from one of us in an article or a clip from England social media or something from Pollock's own commercial, his Eddie Hearn thing. They'll be finding ways to use all of that internally. And we know they do that. One of Felix Jones spends half his week delving back into things that someone might have said weeks and weeks ago. Pollock was out here, was he captaining the under-20s when he was 18? won the junior world cup but before that he was kept oh was it when he was the 18s he was really under 18s and they lost in the last minute to what he called polo called like a hometown decision from the referee and he and he's like swearing on camera like you can just imagine all of these little things the box will will bring in camp and turn into some form of personal ammunition for for their own guys well do you know it's maybe not representative of the entire media but i was just in the lobby of a hotel earlier and saw a copy of the the star newspaper and turned to the back what's the first name on the back of the paper pollock yeah and it's talking to one of the old box being like i don't think peter stefley toys can have sleepless nights about henry pollock and then the inside piece is well pollock's come here and he he's posted on his social media see you soon there's an african flag and a blood emoji kind of stuff like it's all gonna be part of the narrative isn't it what charlie's saying about razzy going well he's really physical and then Brayton Poulser, who was the...

8:25Alex Lowe: That was it, yeah. ...quoted, saying, I'm not sure they're too scared of him. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's all part of building that narrative and that collision when I suspect he'll be on the bench so when he comes on second half at Ellis Park. So, for those who haven't seen it, this is the box team, and, like, wince if you want. So, going from... They list it all in random orders, but let's do it in our traditional way. So, Ox and Che, Malcolm Marks, Thomas de Toi, Eben Etzebeth, only this is going to be his seventh game of the season. because obviously he had that ban for the eye gouge on Alex Mann.

8:59Ruin Nokir, Sir Kalisi captain at six, Peter Stefti Toy at seven, also going to only be his seventh match of this season, first proper game since December in Japan. Jasper Viser at eight, Grant Williams, Manny Libok at ten, no Andre Pollard in the hole, 23. Wings, Kirtley Arons and Cheslin Colby. Stuart Barnes suggesting Colby could well kick the goals. Fascinating look out for that. Damien D 'Alende and Jesse Creel, the sort of World Cup winning centre combination. And then Willem Sir at full back. And then just because it's South Africa, we have to talk about the bench as well. Charlie, it's both a 5-3 and a 6-2.

9:39So give us your hot takes on the South African team there, Charlie.

9:43Charlie Morgan: My hottest take is probably that it reminds me of seeing All Blacks team announcements from the mid-2010s. When you know they have all these fantastic players. but then when you see them written down specifically in this case in the starting side you're going yeah wow the sort of spine of marks exabeth and then a ludicrous back row of sia calisi peter steptoy and jasper visa that's going to be a handful um i think the bench is interesting this this time because there's a there's a sort of hint of inexperience in the front row and we spoke about razzi saying that porthen over low was about the mobility and maybe um conceding a little a little bit of power of the scrum but when you've got van Staden there, Hanukum who had a ding-dong against Pollock when Saints travelled to the Bulls a couple of seasons ago, Reinick, Kane and Moody and then the one that really interests me Andre Estherhaisen who effectively makes it a 5-3 and a 6-2 bench at the same time because he's been deployed in the back row for the boxes last year and in that period he's really established himself, I think, finally as a Springbok.

10:50Charlie Morgan: And he's so familiar to English viewers because of the way he just tore into the Premiership. So seeing him potentially in that very influential spot in a Test match, yeah, it just sums up the kind of ask that England have ahead of them. What about you, Alex? What jumped out at you when you saw that line-up?

11:09Alex Lowe: So, I guess you look at that 23 and think they don't have Lou Diego, they don't have Argie Schneiman, they don't have Quacker Smith. Mostert. They don't have Franco Mostert, they don't have Andre Pollard. But even just the forwards there, they are short of some of their most physical, most imposing players, and yet they name a team like that. Razzy was talking about the threat England might have and how he thinks they'll play this open game. but England they can't play an open game if they can't match the physicality and I think that's that's huge just one other point is you talk there about how few games they've played I think that's really interesting because it could go both ways but I think Razzie has yeah there's a long conversation about England and about resting the captain and player welfare and the balance of how many games they play and the control or lack of that Steve Borthwick has over his players who are all playing in England, never mind the conversation about Jack Willis captaining Toulouse to the French title and being man of the match in the final.

12:12Alex Lowe: Razzi has created, over the last few years with South Africa, he's brought a team, almost all of them, like Tom Soutoich starts on Saturday, he's leaving Bath to come back to South Africa. Barely any South African, in fact no front line South African Springboks now playing in France or or England they are all either in Japan on easy street barely playing or not playing at all like Peter Stefft-Toyt or they're in here in South Africa where they fall under a central system and Razzi has so much more control and influence over how they play and so he's managing his senior players through to the World Cup and while and while so doing in in their absence from club rugby there's other players coming through getting game time the flip side which England will hope to exploit is these guys haven't played very much recently now whether does Peter Stephanie need loads of games to be at 100 % I don't think he does he did 70 against Barbares the other day I think he's one of those players who just comes in and hits his level straight away kind of like you've got Courtney Laws to be the same sort of thing so I think Razzie's created this structure now where he's got all of his best players under his complete control.

13:30Alex Lowe: England've got to find a way into this game somehow, don't they, Charlie? And I think maybe they'll look at the lack of game time in some of those guys and think, can we test them there?

13:41Charlie Morgan: Yeah, I think perversely it's a decent time for England to play the Springboks, notwithstanding the losing run that England have been on during the Six Nations, just because of that argument that there could be a little bit of rust about the Springboks and if England do manage to maintain a bit of impetus from that performance in Paris, then they could maybe put something together that troubles them. And I think England will back their bench as well. Yeah, right. Well, because it is the inaugural Nations Championship, we need to keep calling it that, the inaugural Nations Championship. At least you know what it's called, unlike the head coach of South Africa.

14:16Yeah, go on. So what was he trying to call it?

14:18Alex Lowe: Last week he was asked about it and he said, we don't see it as a competition or a tournament. We just see it as a series of tests. And then today clearly someone's had a word in his ear. And initially he hadn't said anything. And he obviously remembered he was supposed to address the fact that this is actually an important competition. The one to win. So he interrupted himself when he was giving an answer to Afrikaans and referred back to a question that he'd already answered once. He said, oh, I should add that to win any competition, you have to win every game. And we don't play the rugby championship to accrue bonus points.

14:53Alex Lowe: If you just win every game, you'll win the competition. it's the same with the rugby championship and it's the same with this the the nation what's it the nation's championship you've tried to rescue the situation made it worse and you've made it worse on camera by actually forgetting what the whole thing's called in the first place well look right as this is the first pod of the summer and the nation's championship we should do a deep dive into the whole thing what it means who it is who's playing all that sort of stuff it obviously all kicks off next Saturday but let's dive into the sort of whys and wherefores after a little break.

15:29Okay so we're finally here in the first week of the Nations Championship, a competition that's kind of been long discussed, feels like we've been writing about the wranglings of it for what like six or seven years isn't it Alex?

15:39Alex Lowe: Brett Gosper was in charge of World Rugby, they had the first iteration of it, it's got knocked back obviously yeah it's been in the works for a long time and we've or i've certainly anecdotally found that a lot of very engaged rugby fans don't even know what it is the format why it's happening and all that so i'm going to try and keep this as quick as possible but because i know that a lot of people won't exactly know the whys and wherefores so here's a little explainer 12 teams six nation sides france england ireland italy scotland wales pitted against the rugby championship teams aussie Argentina, New Zealand, South Africa plus Fiji and Japan the invited guests, that's a financial thing invited guests means you don't get as much of the pie as everyone else fine, teams play three July games and three November games, the results count to a league table, the six nations and rugby championship results are not included I know that people still are getting that wrong then there's a final series which we'll have after we've established the log it will kind of be north versus south brackets, Japan are a Southern Hemisphere team despite geographically being in the north.

16:47And it will work like the Ryder Cup singles. It'll be this November, it'll be at Twickenham and you'll get, imagine your log table, six versus six, so the sixth place Northern Hemisphere side against the sixth place Southern Hemisphere side and then fifth be fifth, fourth be fourth, third be third, second be second, first be first. The winner of that is the new Nations Championship champion.

17:05Charlie Morgan: The inaugural champion. The inaugural champion. We never say that in any other way, do we? inaugural it's a sports thing isn't it very quickly England Scotland and Wales are on the same schedule as each other so they're playing South Africa Fiji and Argentina away this year then hosting New Zealand Aussie Japan that means that France Italy and Ireland are doing it the other way around so that's the nation's championship Alex does rugby need the nation's

17:30Alex Lowe: championship what's your view on it all so I had a chat with Johnny Northcroft the football correspondent for Times Sunday Times about this very thing and they have a similar concept in football where they've introduced a nation's league to replace those those sort of pointless friendlies those uncompetitive friendlies at Wembley where they make 12 changes through the game and it and it loses all sorts of structure but rugby never had that these games were never friendlies these summer tests November tests they were they were important standalone test matches and I really feel that the game will miss like if this was this Saturday was the first test of a three-test series against South Africa.

18:09Alex Lowe: Even with everything else that's going on in the world of sport, with what's happening in the cricket, with the Football World Cup, Wimbledon's just started. I feel it would have more cut through than us. Even me having to explain to rugby friends why are England going to South Africa, Liverpool, Argentina in three consecutive weeks. It's designed, we're told, by the executives and broadcasters to create a bigger financial income, basically more attractive to broadcasters because there is a narrative. but what we're being asked to do is buy into a narrative in order to create the finals weekend in November and it's a hard sell because the travel is not going to help England at all it's bitty it's disruptive and you know we've been on recent tours to Australia tests three test series New Zealand two test series they build they build a narrative there's a natural narrative that gets built and I think they're going to really struggle to build a narrative through this given the whole is geared up for one weekend in November.

19:06Charlie? It's interesting, isn't it? Because I think I agree with loads of that with you, Alex. And I guess there's another thing in there which we've referenced already. Do the teams care yet about winning it?

19:19Alex Lowe: Well, they don't even know what it's called. They don't know what it's called, so no. They don't care about winning it. Steve Borthwick hasn't brought England here. He's not revving them up going, right, we're going to win at Ellis Park. In order to set ourselves up for... Because we want to get some momentum them into our Nations Championship campaign. The narrative will only become a narrative right at the very end when you're building into a finals weekend. England have come here to win a game to try and get themselves out of the hole that they dug for themselves in the Six Nations.

19:45Charlie Morgan: It feels like that and the World Cup cycle are far more significant themes than the Nations Championship at the minute. I would say that maybe we'll get more of an idea about how much teams buy in in the second block of these up in up in november and i think also a key reason for all of this happening was to sort of make it a more robust commercial product as well and we'll probably get more of an idea of how how well they're working towards that one thing i would say is that the approach that france have had towards these summer tests have kind of been it's frustrating it's best to say it's frustrated southern hemisphere nations for a while hasn't it because um for example and it's kind of distilled in DuPont has become the sort of lightning rod for it because he's only played 25 minutes of test rugby in the southern hemisphere and that being in South Africa when he was 20 years old or something like that however France have and ironically just before we recorded this DuPont kind of pulled out but France have found a way to pick a very strong squad they've been helped by Bordeaux not getting into the barrage stages of the top 14 but it seems like Fabien Gaultier has now I think he's even sort of explicitly said this is a new competition and feels like a new start for them as far as how they're prioritizing it but i certainly take all of those points too i think you know when it was

21:06Alex Lowe: announced there is merit there is some merit in what's happening and i think in a lot of ways it's the second tier that could benefit from this more than the top tier the nation's cup the nation's cup where it will it features the likes of i mean samoa and tonga portugal Spain, Canada, teams who Hong Kong don't have enough regular fixtures and didn't have enough regular fixtures and would literally have to phone each other with their diaries open going are you up to anything on the 21st of July you fancy a game and it was really sporadic. If it gets to a point where there's proper promotion and relegation which again see it when I believe it and teams can there's then jeopardy at the bottom of this and teams can come up maybe that'll add a bit more but I think the structure of giving the second tier nations guaranteed fixtures between World Cups is a positive element to this.

21:56Alex Lowe: What I notice from the language that is being used to promote this from Sanzar and Six Nations is that there's lots of euphemisms. The winner of this is the most dominant team of the year, not the best team in the world. They're trying to not call them the world champions. They can't because they can't call them the best team in the world because the best team in the world is supposed to be the winner of the World Cup, which is next year. So if you want to build a narrative through this competition, it has to mean something. But if you can't be considered the best team in the world because it undermines the World Cup, then what is everyone playing for?

22:29Alex Lowe: And this year, South Africa, for example, have got the greatest rivalry that they've set up independently of the Rugby Championship. And they're far more engaged with that. Which is what they're far... This game isn't sold out, as you were reporting. The England game, you would imagine, would always sell out. It's not selling out at Ellis Park. The ticket prices are too high. plus the All Blacks are in town twice later this year plus they're playing provincial games in this part of the world as well. And Scotland in Pretoria in two weeks. People take their choice, don't they? I think there's a lot of work this competition has to be done if it's going to break through and be considered an important competition to win and right now England always have an issue that they do not peak at all until World Cups.

23:12Alex Lowe: They don't give themselves a chance to win. Eddie Jones talked about it in the paper at the weekend the whole way that the English game is set up is let's just do our best through the four years and then the England coach will get his guys together for two and a half months and then we'll have a puncher's chance at the World Cup but if you're trying to create a better narrative between World Cups then this competition needs to cut through and it needs to mean something but how does a global competition mean enough without undermining the World Cup every four years? Yeah, I've got so many different thoughts on this too, and you've triggered a few of them in my head.

23:47So one of them is that it's never going to really be crowning a world champion because it doesn't include all of the results in the year. Yes. So it's only your record against the other lot. It's not your record against your lot. So it's like France win the six nations, and Ireland win the nation's championship. So who's the dominant team then? Because the results against each other aren't counted, and then you're sort of never-ending that argument. And maybe that's part of the fun because particularly like Box and Ireland, they quite like slagging each other off about who's number one in the world and all that sort of stuff.

24:20And then the other bit is there's sort of like a give and a take there with the emerging nations, isn't there? It's the 12 teams that are qualified for the next World Cup. Great that they're playing games which should be similar standards. Separately, you look at the fixture list and so that, as you said, The teams in the Nations Cup are Canada, Chile, Samoa, Tonga, Uruguay, USA versus Georgia, Hong Kong, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Zimbabwe. And those games are all happening in the Americas over the next few weeks as well. And like, bless them, who's watching them? In stadiums in Vancouver, in stadiums in Santiago, in stadiums in Montevideo.

24:59Charlie Morgan: And aren't the teams at the top of that now getting fewer cracks outside of the World Cup? And does it lock them out? Which are the things that really engage their...

25:09Alex Lowe: They're supposed to get their cracks at Tier 1 in Lions years. World Cup and Lions years.

25:13Charlie Morgan: Let's see that happen. So a diluted version of those top teams because of the... Because then England will rotate because it's like, oh, well, it's only Chile. Indeed, yeah. All that. So that's one thing there. And then there's a, as you also touched upon, we're meant to have relegation at some point in this. Supposedly 2030. but there's no chance that's happening really is there so let's so as a scenario right let's imagine just on current form Wales finish bottom of the sort of like European section of this that means that the next edition they will be playing their July games against let's say Zimbabwe Samoa Tonga and Uruguay and their home games against Canada USA and Chile and you're like that's the end of Welsh rugby the stadium doesn't sell out for any of those games the whole thing's gone to hell in a handcart, right?

26:04Which is the reason why relegation won't happen as much as it's like, well, that sort of should be what it is about, right?

26:10Alex Lowe: Yeah. And the other, we know we're talking all negatives here, but the other negative is the imbalance in this championship just from travel. So the Southern Hemisphere teams, when they come to Europe in November, only have to go as far as like Scotland to Rome. England are going to cover almost 30 ,000 miles in three weeks to play at altitude in Johannesburg, back to play Fiji in Liverpool and out to play Argentina, not even in Buenos Aires, but then another hop into the middle of the country to play Santiago del Estero. That is an inherent disadvantage to the teams on that leg, which is another inbuilt negative, I think.

26:50Alex Lowe: And it only works if all the teams throw everything at it. And I can't help but feel that this summer, if France could take the strongest team and play three tests in the Southern Hemisphere, if England were here playing three tests against the Springboks, we would all be more excited. And I go back to my original point about where it's worked in football was because there was a problem, that those friendlies were not competitive and that the team that finished the game was completely different to the team that started the game. Rugby hasn't had that issue of uncompetitive summer tests and November tests, I don't believe especially for teams like England so they've created a new thing to replace something that was always so compelling and we were talking at breakfast about that summer a couple of years ago where every series Wales and South Africa Ireland and New Zealand England and Australia they all went down to the final day deciding now that was that doesn't happen every time but how good was that day where you had back test matches it was 2022 I think was it where there was a test series on the line and we're talking here England are collapsing to lose at Trent Bridge you know in the grand scheme of test cricket what does a three match series against New Zealand mean it doesn't mean anything in over a 20-year period but when you're in it it feels big you're in it to win it and that's what rugby has had and it's replaced it with something that feels more it's new it feels artificial and it's going to be really hard for it to break through they need some huge games over the next three weeks to win people away from other sports.

28:27Alex Lowe: And to make one additional point, sorry, I'm banging on it, we're now touring these games being played in July because the international season was restructured, moving the summer tours from June into July to suit the Southern Hemisphere, to suit Super Rugby. Super Rugby is now contracted, South Africa have left it, and yet we're still stuck with July tests, which means that the Prem doesn't start until late September, You're now on tour of July. The Lions last year finished in August. It's not presenting international rugby in its prime window because there's so much else going on. These games should be played in June and the season should be structured back again to how it was previously.

29:07And also on that is this competition, the Nations Championship, is always going to butt up against the World Cup and the Euros. Massive football summers. So like when we get to Argentina and hopefully you're all still with us at that point, we're quite hoping that it's an England Argentina or an Argentina Brazil semi-final on the Tuesday that we're in Buenos Aires and then World Cup finals on the Sunday and if Argentina are in the World Cup final on the Sunday who's watching the rugby on the Saturday yeah yeah that's fascinating but so here's here's two sort of these are maybe like backhanded complimenty things like positives wrapped with negatives perhaps rugby if you talk to administrators about the nation's championship they're like rugby was desperate for this it needed this yeah and then what they mean by that is the fact that making this into a like a league thing and a package meant that they could unlock different sponsorship we'll get onto that and broadcast and we were sort of on that path weren't we with the autumn nation series that was sort of the bridge towards this whereas Whereas remember the old summer tour summers, it'd be like, where's the game?

30:13Oh, right. Well, Wales are on BBC or S4C. England are on Sky. Then you've got, oh, maybe Channel 4 might pick up some odd game. You might get a rubbish stream for a New Zealand game because they've not quite got the rights. Whereas now, all of it's on ITV if you're a UK viewer. And actually, I think this is going to be a good sofa watching Saturday. These three Saturdays, you've got six games from like eight in the morning to eight o 'clock at night and a bit of world cup thrown in there as well you're going to have to say to your partner and your kids if they're not interested themselves like put me out the space on the sofa like you start the day with all blacks france you get english and africa in the middle and you got argentine and scotland in the end for example that's a good day it'd be better for viewers on telly than it will for people in the grounds right succeeded in doing that in november without

31:00Alex Lowe: just because the six nations centralize the tv rights so they were all on the same they're all on TNT, weren't they? So you can do that without having to construct the idea that you're playing for your hemisphere. Well, that's a bit of a nonsense. So they've got, again, to add context on that, there's going to be a hemisphere trophy. So in that Ryder Cup singles day on the final weekend, the hemispheres are going to win points for how well they did against the other lot. And so, like, let's say France win the nation's championship. DuPont, it'll be like the triple crown kind of thing. DuPont will get the nation's championship trophy and like well done the north and so it's like what Wales fans are going to be like oh I hope England do one over on the All Blacks it's like as I said on previous part I'm I'm not I'm not one of those who's like instinctively against innovation like I think the game definitely needs it I applaud a lot of the things that the Prem are doing I just struggle to see how constructing something so new in in order to maximize some income is actually going to help because if you can't bring the fans with you then what are they buying into that that's where i i you know i think i have a lot of work to do to convince me and others that this is actually going to take off which probably leads us on to the lack of sponsors yeah so i'm going to write this piece on tuesday but we can talk about it briefly here and then we'll let's move on to the actual rugby because there's some big games coming we wrote in march i think that Qatar Airways were going to sponsor this tournament.

32:30Then Straight Hormuz closes. Trump bombs Iran with Israel. Trouble in the Middle East. They don't quite exactly have the free cash available to suddenly start sponsoring sports competitions. So this competition is starting without a title sponsor. By November, they hope it's going to be called the Qatar Airways Nations Championship. And that is going to lead, as we've been reporting for a while, that the final series will be in Doha in 2028, November 2028. and I was talking to, I exclusively reveal that I was talking to Mark Alexander from SA Rugby, the president of SA Rugby today and his view on that issue playing in Qatar is well rugby needs the money and the fans will come wherever the rugby is, discuss because that there's a lot of like moral political financial things in there at play aren't there.

33:21Alex Lowe: I think my take on the Qatar thing is you've got to build it before you move it is that so their vision is Qatar in 28 the USA in 30. Sounds like slightly cooling on that perhaps the US thing. That was the original plan but that is definitely been touted yet. World Rugby are trying to get big events in the USA pre-Rugby World Cup but you've got to you've got what are people traveling for it goes back to the if people what are people engaged in it's got to mean something it's got to feel important And I think you've got to build it before they take it somewhere.

33:53Charlie Morgan: And what's the price of leaving that tradition of having home autumn internationals as well? Because it's kind of different for different nations, isn't it?

34:01Alex Lowe: I think you'd only take the finals weekend. Yeah, so this would just be the fourth round, I guess. Okay. But they're hoping to sell it. I mean, look, the 2022 FIFA World Cup there went really well as a sports event. And people actually attended it, said it was brilliantly organised and everything else. there was a lot a lot of problems like morally politically plenty of stuff that was important that lots of journalists wrote about but when the people actually went to the event they said it was brilliant but i think i'm struggling to imagine italy against fiji on a friday night in doha selling out are you like yeah exactly it's direct flights for everyone very different but you can't compare it to a football world cup it's not like a festival of it's not like bilbao was yeah where we say brilliant two games on a weekend everyone's having a great time in a different territory because this was an example that mark alexander used that well champions cup final was in spain not a traditional rugby country and you're like oh quite different from the middle east that doesn't quite have the same political issue there does it i think i think there's and the thing about rugby needing the money i mean obviously it does because you would never turn it down and there's always more that you could invest and by the way sorry on the money this would unlock hundreds of millions of pounds.

35:12This is not just like a little drop in the ocean. This is a massive cash cow they would unlock.

35:17Alex Lowe: But it's not a competition that's owned by World Rugby. No. It's owned by Sanzar and the Six Nations. So they can kind of do what they want. So if they're getting hundreds of millions to the top ten nations in the world, how much of that is filtering down to that second tier? Which is run by World Rugby. Which is run by World Rugby. So you then get a more competitive World Cup, which is what everybody wants. But if the rich just get richer and the second tier are left where they are then you're going to struggle to grow. You're potentially constricting the game. You're actually constricting it when they want to be expanding the World Cup.

35:55Alex Lowe: So I think that's problematic. Of course it needs more money. If you can unlock hundreds of millions for the good of the global game then you have a conversation about is it worth it and can you bring enough people with you to understand what you're trying to achieve but you need to show that it's actually working for everybody and um i think it's a lot like i said i think you have a lot they need to prove yeah well why don't we leave rest is rugby politics there for a second um hopefully that's interesting for everyone because as i say like i know plenty of people who are season ticket holders at prem clubs who don't know what's coming so hopefully we've tried to sort of encapsulate all the issues and talk all through what exactly is happening over the next few weeks.

36:37Alex Lowe: And whatever happens to England on Saturday, the match report is not about how they kicked off their entrance championship. Hey, they've got a bonus point. Losing bonuses. It's not about that for England. It's about...

36:48Charlie Morgan: There are bigger contacts.

36:50Alex Lowe: 100%.

36:51Charlie Morgan: More significant contacts at play for sure. So, after this, let's get on to the rugby itself, because there's some big test matches coming this Saturday.

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38:03notes to New Zealand journalist Jamie Wall being like I'm going to have to say this guy's name on the pod quite a lot over the next few weeks so please just tell me how to do it because he's a Maori and is an excellent journalist and everything else and he sent us a voice note being like it's Finiangar Naufel so we got it and like look maybe it's from one for another pod but there's a big issue there with whether or not he's going to Newcastle but I'd be surprised if he doesn't make his debut over the next few weeks and he's been in hot form Charlie for the Canes.

38:29Charlie Morgan: Yeah yeah been carving up that Hurricanes team how much do they bring across does Ruben Love get a big sort of say in how they guide the side he looks seriously good he does so I've had a interviewed Clark Laidlaw the um Hurricanes head coach back end of last week and he was he just gave some really refreshing insight on how he felt that Ruben Love just needed to take obvious options in the middle of that super rugby season because he'd not played a great deal at 10 he mainly played at 15 and the sort of Hurricanes coaches were sort of just guiding him towards backing yourself and it's going to be really interesting to see how that translates to the test arena Ardy Saver being the captain really sets a I think sets a really strong tone from from Dave Rennie but I we've touched on it earlier in this podcast but I love France in these summer windows when they just get to show their staggering depth and this time that this squad because of how the season the domestic season worked out for Bordeaux So a lot of this tour is about how those Bordeaux guys, Biawiri has been rested, but Lucu and Jalibert, they'll get a chance to guide the side as a half-back pairing and they'll potentially get a whole block to do it.

39:47Charlie Morgan: So, yeah, wow. That's class, Lucu and Jalibert, probably being 9-10 away at the All Blacks, new stadium. That's going to be fun.

39:55Alex Lowe: It actually saves Galtier a really tricky selection thing. In fact, Dupont was picked for the second two tests and is now dropped out injured because Dupont is Dupont. You can't not pick him. And yet, Leucou has been the best scrum half in France in Europe this year. World? Roygaard, Cam Roygaard, who we're also going to see. But Leucou, I mean, he was, for me, European Player of the Year. He wasn't even on the short list. He was staggering in the semi and the final, yeah. He was the man of the match in the quarter, semi and final. He was unbelievable. So on that basis, you could not pick Leucou, particularly given how well he works for Jalbert.

40:33Alex Lowe: So Dupont's injury has sort of saved Galtier a selection headache there, because I think those two, they just work so beautifully together. They understand each other so well. And I actually thought Dupont, who hasn't been at his best post-injury, and that in Six Nations, he played the sort of, he played the Leucou role fairly well, Six Nations just allowed Jalipere a bit more chance to run things when normally he would run it himself but yeah to watch those two up against the All Blacks Roy Garden and Love If Love Plays 10 that's that's pretty that's pretty special it's gonna be good we're gonna leave do a couple of minutes on England and Africa at the end and obviously we're gonna do loads more on Thursday but other fixes Japan Italy's interesting Eddie Jones banned for abusing referees in Australia and then one of the other things with that which is more sort of nation's championship negativity perhaps is that Ireland pushed hard for their game against Japan not to be in Japan so Japan are going Tokyo against Italy going down to Newcastle in New South Wales for a home game for a home game against Ireland and then going back to Tokyo to play France which which is interesting because initially England were playing Fiji and Port Elizabeth and now England obviously haven't fought hard enough they're going back to the uk to play fiji and then out to argentina and then on the on the fiji note so fiji are on a uk tour they've probably got the easiest logistics of anyone yeah so they're playing cardiff city against wales this saturday then they're playing hill dickinson everton england and then they're playing murrayfield against scotland all home games and like obviously i think everyone would prefer fiji to play at home but the sort of rugby economics there actually fiji have preferred to play in the uk because they're on european market unlocking european cash and they can have the access to all of their players because we know with lots of these southern hemisphere teams they don't even though it's written down they should it doesn't always happen yeah but i always feel bad for fijians at home because you go like brilliant when are they kicking off three in the morning in fiji yeah but anyway so there's that one they'll all watch it though they will all watch it yeah wales i mean just got to win games, Charlie, basically?

42:48Charlie Morgan: Yeah, scraped over the line against the Barbarians and that sort of warm-up fixture, notwithstanding a couple of tries from the retiring George North for the Barbarians. So, yeah, Fiji first, that's a big opportunity for them at Cardiff, being an away game in Cardiff. At the football ground, basically away game. And then Argentina are just a side that can blow hot and cold in these windows. So that's an opportunity too, you would say. finishing up with the box is going to be tricky Box in Durban is their final one Wales and Scotland have got Argentina and Cordoba and then they're going to Pretoria to play the box and they're finishing at home with Fiji for an away game going through them we used to talk about how difficult we've now made it easier to find on TV it's not easy to find geographically no

43:38Alex Lowe: I think Australia holds some interest for me as well It's the end of Joe Schmidt and sort of transition into Les Kiss through the next few months. Andy Farrell's Ireland, Andy Farrell going back to Australia a year on from the Lions, but there's a lot of interesting development, I think, underway with both Ireland and Australia. That's a game, neither team are close to being the finished article, but there's a lot of interesting elements. Who does Farrell go with at 10, for example? No, Caelan Doris. Doris isn't there, but Dan Sheehan will be captain on Ian. And then the Wallabies, they've got a year out from the Home World Cup.

44:16Alex Lowe: That's a really interesting game for me to gauge how both teams start to evolve over the next 12 months into that tournament. Yeah, yeah. And then the one we're all here for, well, we're here for, South Africa, England, Ellis Park. And a question, we'll get into this more in the week maybe, but I guess, Alex, the last time we saw England play, they lost 48-46 to France. France they then had a review that strength and support for Steve Borthwick but talk to us about how we think we're pitching this like if if they go and lose heavily at Ellis Park have a tricky one against Fiji and a tricky one against Argentina not necessarily saying they lose all three but do the questions about Steve Borthwick still remain even though they've basically said look he's going to the World Cup come what may so yeah there are a few backed Steve Borthwick in that review they actually strengthened his position as you say will he he had a he had sort of four games to save his job towards the end of the six nations he came out of the review with with the backing through to the world cup but i still think that's dependent on on results there's a huge sea change that needs to happen in in the england team all the language post six nations that you know they were desperately trying to play in a certain way and couldn't make it work that's all been proven now to have been spin frankly you've had jamie george the captain on this tour coming out saying that England weren't prepared to play face play rugby.

45:37Alex Lowe: They went in with the same tactics that worked for them in November. By the time they realised they weren't working, they were on the slide to their worst ever Six Nations. Obviously, that performance in France was refreshing and positive. That's clearly how this team want to play. The challenge is, can they bring that at altitude against a Springboks team? You know, at the very least, we'll need some parity in the physical battle if they're going to unleash kind of the core of Northampton players. so if you're Steve Borthwick you're looking at this challenging summer of a game against the world champions at altitude back home against Fiji who are a threat they tested England severely in November and then over to Argentina it is a you would not want to be judged on this summer if you were the England head coach but if it goes really badly you may have to be and I don't I don't think that backing through to the World Cup can ride out a catastrophe of a summer but if England can show So build on that France game, show the signs of an understanding of each other again, a bit of an identity, which basically means allowing the players to play what they see, give them some license, some power to go and try and play what they see in front of them.

46:49Alex Lowe: Then there'll be some signs of progress and then England will be back on track again. But it's a challenging schedule to try and achieve that.

46:57Charlie Morgan: yeah traditionally when we've spoken about these three test tours traditionally the first test was always when the northern hemisphere side would sort of would supposedly have a jump on the southern hemisphere sides and have that cohesion from the six nations so at one on one hand it's an extremely intimidating challenge for england but on the other you would say it was it was as nice a time as possible that they could have to play the box given it given everything else maybe

47:24Alex Lowe: this is a preview to Thursday's pod but if it's a nice time to play them how do they win this game yeah in what areas because because I think the PR comes into this and yeah this is a preview for Thursday but England have to go out there all they're talking about is going out to to play to empower the players as I just said to go and play heads up rugby and yet the pressure is on and if they can they do they have the legs and the lungs to do that at altitude against a team that will physically dominate them I suspect when the pressure's on for Steve Borthwick who his instinct in those situations is to is to try and play the percentages but what percentages could be in England's favour I think the PR element of it the the tactical element of it will clash and I just don't know where they find the edge to win the game I'm fascinated by that because so I was here a little bit earlier than these two I came on Thursday and on Friday we saw Jamie George and Lee Blackett and it was a lovely little scene we're at St Stithian's college which is where kikise rabada went to school and a few other proteas and spring box and they were doing a coaching session for kids and things like that and jamie george was joking being like oh they're all telling me they're england fans but i reckon if the spring box were here they'd probably say they're south african fans and i just was fascinated i wrote about it for sunday times the sort of contrast you find in south africa a lot wherever you are in the country if like you meet the most lovely welcoming hospitable people who can't do more for you and then you see the spring box i was chatting to someone earlier this week and they were like you will be entering the heart of darkness on saturday that's why i'm annoyed it's not sold out but i think it'll still be raucous like they're trying to get they think 50 odd thousand will still be there and they're gonna be up for it yeah like south africa really really really want to beat england and i'm fascinated about how england play therefore because i did have a moment because jamie george was talking about playing lead back it was like it's very easy to just to revert to type and be risk averse going to be like brackets this is what we did against Italy but I'm wondering like is this a huge double bluff it can't be though can it for the team that they're going to have to pick or want to pick the Saints guys everything else it can be clearly someone like Martin is gonna be key the whole way through the Six Nations about wanting his players to be brave and bold and play with speed and vision and then coach them to do none of those things so they're not box kicking they can't it can be a double bluff but you know and I And I do think that if England, as I said just there, if England can demonstrate that this is now their identity, I don't mean bas-ball it, but the players...

49:56Move the ball to space. That's all they're talking about, isn't it? Exactly.

49:58Alex Lowe: Just play what you see. And actually, that can be kicking. It doesn't have to just be passing wide all the time. Especially if you're getting beaten up. But the point is, it's not the only plan. And for England to have had no plan B, as Jamie Jorce has since admitted, it's actually staggering that England went into Six Nations. And we discussed it at the time, Charlie. like the whole game plan based on something that is a 50-50 ball in the air when it doesn't fall your way you've got no other way of playing contestable kicks blows my mind they could do that so they'll have to have more layers to their game this week and which one and they end up deploying will be will be fascinating so it could easily be a double bluff because the result will matter more but if you if you play that risk averse way and get blown away by 50 what have you got what have you got you've got to fire that's another big step backwards exactly so you've got to you've got to fire some shots you've got to score points as you've as you've written charlie like you england have to fire shots the last time there was a game where either team scored 30 points

50:54Charlie Morgan: 2018 2018 ellis park yeah caclis's first game yeah south africa we've seen them 24-3 up and altitude hit them and they lost 42-39 they were they tried to rip in throw it around

51:06Alex Lowe: and ran out of gas after 25 minutes now they hadn't had the same prep at altitude that this team have had. Eddie took the view to base them in Durban and do the fly in, fly out thing, which is one of the strategies for altitude and it backfired. A strategy that if England win in football against Congo, they're going to employ for Mexico City, which is 500 metres higher than here. So this time England will have been here for 10 days. So scientifically, they should be adapted to it better than that team. But yeah, they tried to rip them apart and it worked for 20 minutes and then they got ground down and Izzykwe got hooked after half an hour for Brad Shields.

51:39Alex Lowe: No, because he was gassed. He hadn't played that altitude or that intensity before, really. So, yeah, England have to score points. How do they do it? We'll discuss more on Thursday. Yeah, well, altitude-wise, more colour from the tour. Me and Dan Sko from the Telegraph have played paddle. And it's also altitude. I think it's a huge issue because we've been dreadful. We've played three times and been smashed every time. So Scoey is liable to smack the ball straight against the back glass anyway. The ball flies further up here. Never mind altitude. Inner air. So this is an excuse culture on the ruck.

52:17But anyway, look, everyone, we're into it. We're at Nations Championship. We're going to be back on Thursday for a sort of full, deeper preview to South Africa, England at Ellis Park. We'll have the England team then. We'll have the England team, exactly. Fascinating what they do with Pollock. Kalori, possibly neither in the 15, let's see. but for now Charlie needs to have a nap are you feeling alright mate?

52:37Charlie Morgan: Yeah I'm okay maybe second wind We need to get a club sandwich as you referenced an hour ago Yeah Club sandwich I'll be right And that's from Alex as well you've had another you've had a day ahead of Charlie so you'll be alright

52:48Alex Lowe: I'm going to write about the box team and I think that point I made earlier about the management of players that Razzie has just absolutely nailed the contrast with where England are is enormous Yeah Right well read all of our stuff on the Times please and if you've got any thoughts theruckatthetimes.co.uk OK, there's going to be plenty to get into over the next three weeks, but we're off and running. Inaugural Nations Championship is here and you're going to follow it all with us. But from Joburg, it's goodbye and see you on Thursday.

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