So after last weekend’s results there has been much debate in the media about the state of Rugby Union in the northern hemisphere – after no northern teams ascended to the World Cup semi-finals.
Initially it seems like a dark time for northern hemisphere rugby. The Six Nations champions, and northern team I thought would go through, Ireland, lost to Argentina. A country with only 57,000 registered rugby players. Wales lost to South Africa. Scotland lost narrowly (and perhaps controversially to Australia). France got ripped apart by a dominant New Zealand. This weekend’s results mean for the 7th time a southern team will win the World Cup – a competition that has only been played 8 times.
Dark days indeed for northern rugby. But is it THAT bad?
If Brian Moore is to be believed there is a clear technical skills gap between the southern and northern rugby union that goes right down to the junior level – a sentiment repeated in the Guardian by Robert Kitson. Others argue that northern teams need to embrace southern coaches to close the gap between north and south. People seem to forget that both Ireland and Wales already have head coaches from the south. Both went out to southern teams.
There is undoubtedly a gap between the north and south – the results speak for themselves. However, arguably that gap is shrinking not growing. In my ignorant opinion, calling the state of rugby union in the north a ‘crisis’ is an unfair assessment.
The results of the weekend were disappointing. But when we take into account Ireland’s world cup woes, Wales’s spate of high profile injuries and the fact Scotland (the wooden spoon winners of the last Six Nations) went toe-to-toe with the Wallabies, that gap seems far less profound.
Take for example, the 2014 Autumn Internationals (the last big north v south contests before the world cup) results played between Tier 1 teams:
England 21-24 New Zealand
Wales 28-33 Australia
Ireland 29-15 South Africa
Scotland 41-31 Argentina
Italy 18-20 Argentina
England 28-31 South Africa
Scotland 16-24 New Zealand
France 29-26 Australia
As you can see, the southern hemisphere won more games (5), however, only by relatively small points margins – average of about 4 points.
If we compare the last Autumn internationals before the 2011 world cup, the results were decidedly more in the south’s favour.
England 9-18 Australia
Wales 12-19 New Zealand
France 20-13 South Africa
Italy 6-20 New Zealand
England 16-9 Argentina
Ireland 20-20 Australia
Italy 10-32 South Africa
England 6-19 New Zealand
Wales 33-16 Argentina
Scotland 9-8 Australia
Ireland 15-10 South Africa
Scotland 6-9 Argentina
Wales 12-33 Australia
France 12-39 New Zealand
The southern hemisphere won 8 out of 14 games played between the Tier 1 teams of each hemisphere. The points difference in these games was far greater than in 2014 (average of 14.5 points).
I’m not trying to say there is not a gap between the northern and southern hemispheres. The south’s winning record is testament to that. However, if there was a crisis is northern rugby it began 4 years ago – maybe even longer than that. If anything, the north’s current record against the south is an improvement on previous years. The best thing northern teams can do now is to keep improving, rather than panic about the so-called ‘crisis’ of northern rugby.
my ignorant opinion 