{"id":260838,"date":"2025-11-04T00:46:07","date_gmt":"2025-11-04T00:46:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/260838\/"},"modified":"2025-11-04T00:46:07","modified_gmt":"2025-11-04T00:46:07","slug":"everything-to-play-for-before-next-months-rugby-world-cup-draw","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/260838\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Everything to play for\u2019 before next month\u2019s Rugby World Cup Draw"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

There\u2019s \u201ceverything to play for\u201d during the Autumn Nations Series, with teams such as the Wallabies fighting for a late rise up the world rankings, while others look to hold their place ahead of next month\u2019s 2027 Men\u2019s Rugby World Cup<\/a> Draw.<\/p>\n

As things stand, the Wallabies are on track for a spot in the second band of pool seedings. If the Australians fail to surge up the world rankings before December 3, they will take on an international rugby heavyweight during the group stage.<\/p>\n

Australia<\/a> could face arch-rivals New Zealand, two-time defending Rugby World Cup winners South Africa, or their most recent opponent England<\/a> in pool play. Ireland, France<\/a> and Argentina<\/a> are also placed in the top six on the world rankings at the moment.<\/p>\n

That makes Australia\u2019s next three Test matches incredibly important. If they can rise up one place on the rankings, they will be placed in the top band for the pool draw, which would see them miss the likes of the All Blacks<\/a> and Springboks at that stage of the tournament.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat team in seventh, we want to see that movement up,\u201d former Wallabies lock Justin Harrison<\/a> said on Stan Sport after Australia\u2019s defeat to England last weekend.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s everything to play for. These end-of-year tours are exactly where they need to be right now.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are players on the field today that will want to be able to get their hands on that jersey to put something that they can be happy with against Italy<\/a> next week. It\u2019s a great opportunity to develop some competition inside this squad and turn things around very quickly.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Wallabies will look to bounce back against Italy this weekend after falling to England at Twickenham\u2019s Allianz Stadium. Harry Potter<\/a> scored Australia\u2019s only try of the Test, as they fell to a 25-7 defeat \u2013 with the English running away with the result in the second term.<\/p>\n

Coach Joe Schmidt was asked about the world rankings after the England match, with the New Zealand-born rugby guru calling on the Wallabies \u201cto build over the next two years and not be afraid of playing one of the big guns.\u201d<\/p>\n

For now, their focus is Italy.<\/p>\n

Australia haven\u2019t faced the Italians in three years, when they suffered a shock one-point defeat. Ben Donaldson<\/a> had a chance to be the hero on debut, but the playmaker missed an attempted conversion which would\u2019ve seen the Wallabies take the win.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we don\u2019t get to six in the world, all we\u2019ve got to do is just keep building, because you can still be a great chance and not be six in the world,\u201d Schmidt told reporters on Saturday.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat would be ideal for us.<\/p>\n

\u201cHaving had some big wins this season so far, I think we\u2019ve demonstrated ability with a full squad that we can knock teams over, and we\u2019ve got to build depth in behind that squad. This tour is really part of that.<\/p>\n

\u201cItaly<\/a>\u00a0will be very tough. They were one score away from England at half-time last time they played them. They\u2019re a good side and they\u2019re coached by a good friend of mine in \u2018Gonzo\u2019 Quesada. I know that Gonzo\u2019s a very good coach and he\u2019ll have them primed.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou look through their team and they\u2019ve got some great attacking players\u2026 so many players that play at the very top level and that\u2019s going to be a massive challenge for us. We\u2019re gonna have to dust ourselves off very quickly.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There\u2019s \u201ceverything to play for\u201d during the Autumn Nations Series, with teams such as the Wallabies fighting for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":260839,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-260838","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-rugby","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-rugby","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260838","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=260838"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260838\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/260839"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=260838"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=260838"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=260838"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}