If Ireland’s history at the Rugby World Cup has taught us anything it is surely not to be presumptuous, particularly when it comes to plotting anything in the knockout stages. After all, Ireland have not won a knockout tie in the previous 10 World Cups, losing eight quarter-finals as well as a quarter-final playoff, and suffering one pool exit. So, let’s remain humble.
As Ireland ought to know better than anyone, winning a group comes with no guarantees. Ireland have topped their pool with unbeaten records in three of the last four World Cups and a fat lot of good it did them, their sole defeats in 2015, 2017 and 2023 tournaments all coming in the quarter-finals.
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Much can also change between now and the start of the 2027 edition, but regardless of how the 2027 World Cup ultimately pans out, Ireland cannot complain about the draw they’ve been handed. This will be the third World Cup pool clash in a row between Ireland and Scotland, and Ireland’s current 11-match winning run in the fixture includes pool victories in Yokohama in 2019 (27-3) and at the Stade de France in 2023 (36-14).
Scotland did beat Ireland 24-15 in their only other World Cup meeting in 1991 at Murrayfield en route to their sole semi-final appearance, but if ever a team will be gunning for Ireland it is Gregor Townsend’s team.
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Even so, the reward for winning Pool D, as opposed to finishing second, look significant. The pool winners will face one of the best third-placed sides in the Round of 16 – possibly Georgia, at a push Italy, or maybe Tonga or Samoa. The winners of that tie would probably face Felipe Contepomi’s ever-improving Argentina in the quarter-finals, presuming they top Pool C ahead of Fiji.
By contrast, the Pool D runners-up would go into the other half of the draw and encounter the Pool E winners – in all likelihood France – in the Round of 16. Although Ireland defeated Les Bleus when they last met in the tournament (a bruising and costly final pool game in Cardiff in 2015), France won the three previous World Cup encounters, in the quarter-finals in 1995 and 2003, and the pool stages in 2007. Not such an appealing prospect. The winners of that Round of 16 game might subsequently face Fiji or Wales in the quarter-finals, and then South Africa or the runners-up from the New Zealand/Australia pool in the semi-finals.
But then again, if it’s a good draw for Ireland, it must be a good draw for Scotland too. They’ll be thinking their losing run in the fixture cannot last forever and that, as all the doomsayers among us maintain, Ireland are irrevocably on the slide.
Furthermore, Argentina are probably looking at the draw and thinking much the same. Los Pumas have reached the semi-finals on three occasions. As well as beating Scotland in two previous World Cup meetings, they have also beaten Ireland in three of four World Cup clashes.
Argentina won a quarter-final playoff in 1999, Ireland won a pool game in Adelaide four years later, a brilliant Argentina team completed Ireland’s dismal 2007 pool exit with a win in Parc des Princes, and they overcame Joe Schmidt’s injury-ravaged side in the 2015 quarter-finals.
Amid all the familiarity, at least there is some novelty in Ireland being drawn against Uruguay, a side they have never met, and Portugal, having beat them by a record 106-7 in their first-ever meeting in July.
By contrast, Ireland and Scotland have met 143 times and, pending two more Six Nations clashes, the familiarity between the Celtic rivals is a part of a distinct trend in the draw.
Australia will most likely host neighbours New Zealand in the opening match in Perth on October 1st, 2027, after the two were drawn in the same pool for the first time.
England and Wales will meet again in the pool stages, a first time since the latter’s stunning win over the 2015 hosts at Twickenham, while Georgia will meet Romania and Italy in Pool B.
At the last World Cup, South Africa and New Zealand lost matches to Ireland and France respectively in finishing second in their pools, yet still ended up in the final.
With that in mind, the reward for winning that Wallabies-All Blacks opener is a dubious one, as the first-placed side in Pool A will be on course to meet the Pool B winners – almost certainly South Africa – in the quarter-finals. The Pool A runners-up would go into the other half of the draw and potentially face Japan in the Round of 16 and England in the quarter-finals.
Then again, one or two unexpected results could shred all this conjecture.
2027 Rugby World Cup draw
Pool A: New Zealand, Australia, Chile, Hong Kong China.
Pool B: South Africa, Italy, Georgia, Romania.
Pool C: Argentina, Fiji, Spain, Canada.
Pool D: Ireland, Scotland, Uruguay, Portugal.
Pool E: France, Japan, USA, Samoa
Pool F: England, Wales, Tonga, Zimbabwe
