Brendan Gallagher: The 69-match journey to the World Cup

Nations Cup
The tenth year of this competition and the ninth to be held in Bucharest. Only the inaugural tournament, in 2006 when Lisbon was the venue, has this competition been held outside Romania. The standard has been variable over the years but the likes of the Emerging Springboks and Emerging Ireland have added quality to proceedings and in World Cup year the three games in 11 days for Romania and Namibia against comparable opposition will provide absolutely vital game time.
Since thrashing Madagascar 89-0 11 months ago to dramatically clinch their place at the 2015 World Cup on the final day of the African qualifying tournament, Namibia have seen little international action although they did put together an autumn programme that featured a home win over Germany in Windhoek and defeats against Canada at Colwyn Bay and Portugal in Lisbon.
A Welwitschias Development XV, essentially all amateurs, has been playing in the Vodacom Cup but the Nations Cup will be the start of their World Cup preparations proper with just yesterday’s Africa Cup match against Tunisia in Tunis by way of warm-up.  Jacques Burger and a number of other senior players based in England and South Africa such as barnstorming Sharks flanker Renaldo Bothama and Western Province flanker Rohan Kitshoff, will be resting throughout June but a five-strong contingent from France will be joining up. They include lock Tjiuee Uanivi and prop Johan Coetzee from Brive and Dax No.8 PJ van Lill.
The inspirational Burger will return to the fold in July when the Namibians will share some time in camp with South Africa and stage a couple of hit-outs against Russia and Africa Cup matches against Kenya and Zimbabwe in August. Former Wales lock and Leeds and Cardiff coach Phil Davies is now helping with the pack and Wayne Proctor, another Scarlet and Wales man, overseeing their fitness work.
As the home team, Romania, who won the tournament in 2012 and 2013, will be more inclined to field their strongest available team and coach Lyn Howells has named their trio of French-based props Paulica Ion, Mihai Lazar and Horatiu Pungea. For the Argentina Jaguars this tournament probably represents the last chance saloon for fringe members of the Pumas World Cup long squad while for the Spanish, with no World Cup on the horizon, it could be a long painful tournament.
Tbilisi Cup
This will be the third year of a tournament designed largely at giving Georgia exposure to a standard of rugby over and above the European Nations Cup (the biennial Six Nations B tournament) which the Georgians have won on seven of the last eight occasions. The two previous winners have been the South African President’s XV and the Argentinian Jaguars. This year it also offers Uruguay a much-needed chance to pack in three quality games in eight days as they undergo a crash course in international rugby while there might also be a later opportunity for members of the Emerging Ireland and Italy sides to stake a late place for World Cup recognition.
Leinster flanker Rhys Ruddock, who missed most the second half of the season with a broken arm, would come into that category.
The main focus, though, will be on Georgia and Uruguay and what improvements can be made three months out from the World Cup and the former’s New Zealand coach Milton Haig said: “Since qualifying a year ago our main focus has been building up our strength in depth and we’ll continue that at the Tbilisi Cup.
“The home-based players have been training with me two or three times a week through the winter and although some of our French-based players have been making their way back after Top14 duties I’ve told them to have a break or take a holiday. That still hasn’t stopped many of them attending our weekly training sessions since they got home – they are very motivated for the World Cup – but my aim is to largely give them a rest and to play some of our younger players.
“Then starting on July 1 our long squad will come together for two months of camps and matches.
“I am looking for cover at half-back and generally backs who can bring more options into our back-play. Already we have uncovered a real talent at scrum-half in Vasil Lobzhanidze who is only 18 and looked a real talent when he made his debut against Russia back in March.
“He will definitely be getting more game time along with a couple of younger backs who have been playing ProD2 rugby in France.”
Uruguay, with the gruesome prospect of having to contest England’s Pool of Death, have been packing in the rugby in the last two months. In May alone, the played and lost, to Chile (30-15) a strongish Jaguars XV (36-14) and a double header against the Fijian warriors, games they lost 42-22 and 30-22.
There is some talent there, especially at scrum-time, but can they get the rest of their game up to anything like true Test standard?
Random Friendlies
The stand-out fixture here is New Zealand’s long awaited first ever Test at one of the Pacific Islands that have served them so well over the last four or five decades.
It was shameful the All Blacks had not visited Apia so, although this game is not ideally timed for either team, we should at least acknowledge the goodwill which has gone into making it happen. The 15,000 capacity Apia Park has been upgraded for both this game and forthcoming Commonwealth Youth Games.
Samoa only gather their full squad together once every four years and will have had little preparation time and no warm-up match but the massive motivation and the fierce heart you usually get in Apia this time of the year will count in their favour.
New Zealand are slotting this fixture in ahead of the Rugby Championship and will also be short of a warm-up game although that seems to affect them less than most. Three days later New Zealand Maori – who have a fine track record of supporting the Islands – travel to Suva for what should be another fiery encounter.
Pacific Nations Cup
Now in its 11th season this tournament can be a mish-mash with different formats and levels of participation but this year’s competition has a good look to it with all the Pacific sides outside New Zealand and Australia you would want and expect present and correct.
The opening match – Fiji against Tonga in Suva – could be explosive while after that the action is concentrated in North America with Canada and the USA hosting rounds two and three and then the Canadians staging the final series of play-offs. A guaranteed four matches apiece for the tier two nations before they move to Europe to tackle the big beasts.
The Rugby Championship
Blink and you could miss the quick-fire Rugby Championship this year with all the teams deciding that a full scale home-and-away tournament is impractical so close to the Word Cup given the wear and tear and massive travel involved.
Instead they play each other just the once while the teams getting only one home match from that arrangement will host a friendly the week after the tournament officially ends. That should help balance the books and provide a World Cup warm-up again away from the strict Championship format where there will be a last opportunity to experiment.
New Zealand have won all three of the six-game modern-day format Rugby Championships since the introduction of Argentina and will, of course, start favourites but with just the one home game – against Argentina – and visits to Sydney and Johannesburg they will have to do it the hard way.
The stand-out games for me are the Boks ‘entertaining’ the All Blacks at Ellis Park which usually produces the Test of the season and Australia in Buenos Aires where the Pumas will be hungry for a big scalp before the World Cup. Their win over Australia last season at Mendoza is their one Rugby Championship victory.
World Cup warm-ups
There are a plethora of World Cup warm-up games with some still be announced but this list of confirmed games gives you a taste of what is around, especially those fans in England who may have missed out on tickets for the World Cup proper but, at probably about a quarter of the price, can still get along to watch some of the teams in action.
I would suggest the matches to particularly look out for are a team’s final match before the completion deadline of August 31 for naming their final squad of 31 and then some of the games the following week when most teams will surely opt to give something approaching their starting XV a final run-out ahead of the competition’s first match on September 18.
So for England their return match against France in Paris on August 22 will be the last game in which a selection dilemma might be resolved while their home encounter against Ireland on September 5 will be a final dress rehearsal for the World Cup. Equally the Ireland-Wales game in Dublin on August 29 could have pretty dramatic last-minute selection connotations.
Elsewhere, Samoa, always box office, seem to have put together the sexiest World Cup run-in and that’s on top of their first home Test against New Zealand.
They start with a real crowd-pleaser against the Barbarians at the Olympic Stadium, a match that will double up as the venue test event, and another biggish crowd is surely likely at their final game, against Wasps at the Ricoh.
Another match which tickles my fancy is Leicester against Argentina on September 5 with neither team exactly known for taking a backward step, even in friendlies.