World Rugby U20 Championship in South Africa 29 June-19 July

First topic message reminder :

England squad announced today:

Forwards
Joe Bailey (Exeter Chiefs, Newton Abbot RFC, 5 caps)
Finn Carnduff (Leicester Tigers, Market Harborough RFC, 15 caps)
Harvey Cuckson (Bath Rugby, Mold RFC, 2 caps)
Afolabi Fasogbon (Gloucester Rugby, Bishop Wand School, 11 caps)
Arthur Green (Bath Rugby, Frome RFC, uncapped)
James Halliwell (Bristol Bears, Thornbury RFC, 10 caps)
James Isaacs (Saracens, Hemel Hempstead Camelot RFC, 3 caps)
Kane James (Exeter Chiefs, St Peters RFC, 4 caps)
Junior Kpoku (Racing 92, Saracens Amateurs, 4 caps)
Nathan Michelow (Saracens, Brentwood Rugby, 10 caps)
Cameron Miell (Leicester Tigers, Paul Roos, uncapped)
Jacob Oliver (Newcastle Falcons, Barnard Castle Rugby Club, 5 caps)
Asher Opoku-Fordjour (Sale Sharks, Broadstreet RFC, 14 caps)
Henry Pollock (Northampton Saints, Buckingham Rugby Club, 5 caps)
Billy Sela (Bath Rugby, Royal Wootton Bassett RFC, 6 caps)
Olamide Sodeke (Saracens, Blackheath Rugby Club, 4 caps)
Craig Wright (Northampton Saints, Braintree Rugby Club, 5 caps)

Backs
Ollie Allan (Leicester Tigers, Hungerford RFC, uncapped)
Josh Bellamy (Harlequins, Rosslyn Park, 4 caps)
Jack Bracken (Saracens, Barnet Elizabethans RFC, uncapped)
Benjamin Coen (Exeter Chiefs, Teignmouth RFC, uncapped)
Toby Cousins (Northampton Saints, Bugbrooke RFC, 6 caps)
Lucas Friday (Harlequins, Bromley RFC, uncapped)
Angus Hall (Saracens, Sevenoaks Rugby Club, uncapped)
Ioan Jones (Gloucester Rugby, Minchinhampton RFC, 4 caps)
Sean Kerr (Harlequins, Sutton and Epsom Rugby Club, 4 caps)
Ben Redshaw (Newcastle Falcons, West Park Leeds RFC, 5 caps)
Oli Spencer (Newcastle Falcons, Epping Rams Rugby, 5 caps)
Ben Waghorn (Harlequins, Chipstead Rugby Club, 7 caps)
Alex Wills (Sale Sharks, Droitwich Rugby Club, 7 caps)

https://www.englandrugby.com/news/article/mapletoft-confirms-squad-for-world-rugby-u20-championship-2024

Wales already announced:

Forwards
Jordan Morris (Dragons)
Josh Morse (Scarlets)
Ioan Emanuel (Bath Rugby)
Harry Thomas (Scarlets)
Isaac Young (Scarlets)
Will Austin (Sale Sharks)
Kian Hire (Ospreys)
Sam Scott (Bristol)
Jonny Green (Harlequins)
Nick Thomas (Dragons RFC)
Osian Thomas (Leicester Tigers)
Ryan Woodman (Dragons RFC – Capt)
Lucas de la Rua (Cardiff Rugby)
Harry Beddall (Leicester Tigers)
Morgan Morse (Ospreys)
Owen Conquer (Dragons RFC)

Backs
Ieuan Davies (Bath Rugby)
Rhodri Lewis (Opsreys)
Lucca Setaro (Scarlets)
Harri Wilde (Cardiff Rugby)
Harri Ford (Dragons RFC)
Macs Page (Scarlets)
Steffan Emanuel (Cardiff Rugby)
Louie Hennessey (Bath Rugby)
Elijah Evans (Cardiff Rugby)
Aidan Boshoff (Bristol Rugby)
Harry Rees-Weldon (Dragons RFC)
Kodie Stone (Cardiff RFC)
Huw Anderson (Dragons RFC)
Matty Young (Cardiff Rugby)

https://www.wru.wales/2024/06/wales-name-u20-world-championship-squad/

Matches to go ahead!

https://x.com/worldrugbymedia/status/1810672938288283800

Update on World Rugby U20 Championship

After further assessments made by organisers and match officials at Athlone Stadium, the pitch has been sufficiently drained to allow rugby to resume in safe conditions.

World Rugby U20 Championship matches remaining at the venue including France U20 v Wales U20 (16:30 GMT+2) and South Africa U20 v England U20 (19:00 GMT+2) will go ahead as scheduled.

Weather and pitch conditions will continue to be monitored closely through the rest of the day.

France vs Wales is underway.

The rain appears to have stopped but the pitch is cutting up. It'll be in a right state for the England match.

I wonder will they reschedule Ireland v Aus now? If not, why not?!

They should consider rescheduling it IMO. The current France vs Wales games looks difficult, passes and lineout throws aren't going to hand due to the wind, it must be a difficult one to play in.

South Africa vs England underway.

It's raining, and South Africa have the wind behind them in the first half.

The Boks have scored an early converted try. There was some pushing and shoving afterwards, and the referee called both captains over to warn both sides.

England gave three penalties away trying to defend their line, and another for offside when attacking in the Boks half. As we are only nine minutes in, the referee told the England captain to change behaviour.

Really not liking this ref so far. Multiple times so far he’s been faced with offences from both sides and chosen to penalise the later England one rather than the initial South Africa one.

On the other hand, England are making too many errors.

England get one back after 29 minutes. Scores level at 7-7

England have picked up a couple of penalties. That might help take the referee's mind off our infringements.

Referee now warns the Boks about discipline.

First half finishes 7-7

England left some points out there. The wind means we chose not to go for goal but we couldn't get anything from several attacking positions in the last ten minutes.

South Africa need a maximum bonus point win, so will have to chance their arm to get three more tries in the second half.

“It’s a tackle!”
South Africa don’t release and rip the ball
“It was ripped before.”

I don't understand how having warned England so early, he took ages to give the Boks a warning and just let the no.9 deliberately slow down a quick tap (whilst offside) twice in the 22 without carding him...

Refreshing to see an English scrum marching a South African one too.

The South African player grabbed the ball while he was lying flat on the floor! The ref was looking right at it!

12-12 after 57 minutes.

England looked to have taken control but a great bit of dribbling got the Boks level with a second try, and that seemed to have inspired them

England have a chance to steady things down. A promising move has a forward pass, though. Our scrum is going well, so that's not necssarily a problem.

England nearly score a great try but just couldn't collect the ball cleanly with the tryline begging.

A bit of a let-off for England, as the Boks kicked deep into our 22, and the ball skidded around dangerously. The Boks gave away a penalty.

Billy Sela is off with an injury

Now England let the Boks off. We had an attacking lineout but took it quickly and the throw-in didn't go five metres.

Followed up by a ridiculous attempt to keep the ball in, I can only assume that he thought it was a penalty.

England don't need to win this match but we do need to stop the Boks scoring two more tries.

Can't help but feel England have butchered this, these aren't a great young Boks team.

70 minutes and England give a penalty away for offside. The Boks call a scrum in our 22.

Boks have a lot of phases, go nowhere, then knock-on.

73 minutes gone

England scrum has eaten up two more minutes

76 minutes, and it's a South African lineout in their own 22. Which they don't throw five metres!

We could have tried a drop goal but eating up time is more important. A drop goal would mean nothing if South Africa get two quick tries.

Boks scrum in their 22. 78 minutes gone.

There's now surely no time for the Boks to score twice. They might want to keep playing to get the win, though.

Scrum to England with half a minute left.

Time up, so we could kick it out.

We've got penalty advantage, and are going for the win ourselves.

We've gone for an attacking lineout.

Now we've gone for an attacking scrum

They should just kick the goal, someone is going to needlessly get injured.

Commentators wondering why we are risking injury by playing on.

Finally!

We maul over for the win

Good to win in tough conditions, nice to put the Baby Boks out of their own tournament too.

Semi-finals are

NZ vs France

England vs Ireland

Rugby Fan wrote:Semi-finals are

NZ vs France

England vs Ireland

That's a very encouraging northern hemisphere showing.

Nathan Grey, the Australian U20 coach, is openly upset that his charges were denied a chance to qualify for the semi-finals by playing their match.

He saw the pitch, and thinks it was no worse than others where matches have gone ahead. He suggested the Irish doctor appeared to get in the heads of the organisers on the matter of safety.

Speaking to RugbyPass shortly after the decision had been relayed to both teams in the stadium tunnel in Athlone, Grey said: “Bitterly disappointed for the players, the staff and everyone. The decision has been taken out of our hands and we don’t get the opportunity to play Ireland and finish on top of our pool.”

Grey had the chance himself to inspect the pitch and he insisted it was playable. “We played two games in the Rugby Championship this year, New Zealand, Argentina, South Africa and ourselves in much worse conditions but a strong push from the Irish doctor seemed to work with World Rugby around cancelling the game.

“Look, it is what it is, the decision has been taken out our hands and we are just going to have to cop it.

“The boys are shattered. We were very well prepared for this game, had a great week training. Trained in worse conditions two days ago at False Bay and the boys were well prepared to play, so it’s an opportunity that has been taken out of their hands. I am sure World Rugby are doing it for the right reasons, I just hope they are true.”

What would Grey have preferred to have seen happen? “Look, play the game. The conditions are fine. The surface water is not really that bad. Yeah, it’s boggy, it’s wet but no worse than any conditions Ireland have played in before and certainly we have played in before.

“The conditions were probably better than what we played our game against Italy (on match day two last Thursday), in so it’s a bit confusing.”

https://www.rugby.com.au/news/australia-u20s-semifinals-hopes-dashed-after-ireland-match-is-cancelled-202479

Weather did stop the New Zealand vs Spain match in Stellenbosch. The Baby Blacks were leading 45-13 at half-time, and that score stood.

As NZ didn't put the expected cricket score on Spain, England had a better points difference. That means if we had scored one more try against South Africa, and taken maximum points, we would have ended up with France in the semi-final, and Ireland with New Zealand. Both England and Ireland are probably happier with the way the draw has actually fallen.

Rugby Australia are formally calling for their match against Ireland to be played today

https://www.smh.com.au/sport/rugby-union/ra-launch-appeal-as-mud-sticks-for-junior-wallabies-after-ireland-washout-20240710-p5jsfc.html

Forecast suggests the semi-finals might be rain affected also.

If Nathan Grey sees the conditions for today's match between Samoa and Spain, he will be furious.

It's raining cats and dogs, and the pitch has lakes of water on it. It would be interesting to know why this is considered playable, while the Ireland vs Australia U20 fiture was abandoned.

Sounds like the Irish doctor played a worldie. England lost two players to injury Vs South Africa and have a five day turnaround. Ireland have a ten day turnaround to prepare to face a side they drew against in the 6N.

The doctors dont make the call world rugby does, it rained solid for three days with cyclones. I am sure the Ireland team 100% wanted to play.

Argentina went out to an early lead against South Africa. It looked for all the world that the Baby Boks would level things up before half-time but the Pumas held out and scored again.

Argentina 24-10 South Africa at half-time

These matches are streaming for free on Rugby Pass TV. If you are waiting for the football, then they will chew us some time.

The Baby Boks took a tap, and a converted try would see them draw level at 24-24.

The referee couldn't see it grounded, and his assistant ten yards away was certain it was held up. It wasn't reviewed but a replay suggested it might have been OK, though maybe not enough to overturn the onfield decision if it had been reviewed.

Minutes late, Argentina scored a try in the corner after the TMO decided the Argentinian's foot wasn't in touch. The South African commentator compared it to Mark Cueto in 2007.

Argentina lead 31-17

Argentina win 34-24.

That's a poor return for the Baby Boks in a tournament on home soil.

Collapse2005 wrote:The doctors dont make the call world rugby does, it rained solid for three days with cyclones. I am sure the Ireland team 100% wanted to play.

Sorry it was a tongue in cheek reference to the Australian Head Coach complaining that the Irish doctor had gone to the officials and argued heavily about the game not being played. Two games at the same venue were played on the same day I believe. If I was a Wallaby coach I'd be fuming as well.

The Irish players might well have fancied it but the coaching staff looking at the bigger picture would have known that a draw would have taken them through and give them a 10 day turnaround to prepare for the knock out game. A great result for them considering the other sides all played in the poor positions and then have a shorter turnaround. Depending on whether you look at it as a competition to win or a development tool of course.