Autumn Nations Cup - fixtures, coverage, players to watch

http://mygoogle.ezyro.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/1604912353_Autumn-Nations-Cup-fixtures-coverage-players-to-watch-300x169.jpg"

Alun Wyn Jones, Stuart Hogg, Owen Farrell and Johnny Sexton – captains of Wales, Scotland, England and Ireland respectively

Stay home.

Rugby’s southern-hemisphere superpowers are certainly sticking to the UK government’s advice.

Usually, at this time of year, New Zealand, South Africa and Australia would migrate north for the autumn Tests.

Not in 2020. The Springboks are confined to barracks. Australia and New Zealand have played each other four times in less than a month in front of home crowds of maskless thousands, with coronavirus cases there relatively low.

And, in their absence, in the north, a new concept has been cooked up: the Autumn Nations Cup.

It is international rugby, but not as we know it.

The format

The tournament involves eight teams, split into two pools.

Pool A comprises England, Ireland, Wales and Georgia. Pool B is France, Scotland, Italy and Fiji.

Each team plays every other team in their group over three successive weekends, starting on Friday, to complete the pool stages.

Then the top-ranked team in Pool A plays the top-ranked team in Pool B, the second-ranked team in Pool A plays their equivalent in Pool B and so on for a final weekend of fixtures to decide the final placings.

The teams

England lifted the Six Nations title back at their London hotel base after returning from a victory away to Italy in the final round

The Six Nations, interrupted by the outbreak of coronavirus, only ended just over a week ago. Instead of the usual 11-month break from local rivalries, those same teams are being thrown back into competition.

And the storylines continue.

Will newly-crowned champions England add world rugby’s newest title to one of its oldest?

Can Scotland build on a Six Nations campaign that gathered strength as it went?

Can Wayne Pivac rediscover Wales’ mojo after five defeats in their past six games?

Will Ireland, two years on from an historic win over New Zealand in Dublin, find that fluency, urgency and accuracy again?

And, will the rebirth of France…

Read the Original Article on _{Source Page}

#Autumn #Nations #Cup #fixtures #coverage #players #watch

Autumn, Coverage, Cup, fixtures, Nations, players, watch
General