Having completed a clean sweep of wins in the first full set of fixtures in the Autumn Nations Series, the dominance of the leading southern hemisphere sides could be underlined further this weekend by making it a 1-2-3 in the World Rankings.
After six weeks at number two in the rankings, South Africa reclaimed top spot after they beat Scotland 32-15 at Murrayfield and the previous number one ranked team Ireland lost 13-23 against New Zealand. In ending Ireland’s 19-game winning streak at the Aviva Stadium, New Zealand moved up to second with Andy Farrell’s team dropping down to third.
Theoretically, Ireland are one of three teams who could finish top of the rankings by the end of the weekend, along with South Africa and New Zealand. However, South Africa are guaranteed to stay on top if they beat England at Allianz Stadium on Saturday.
New Zealand will replace South Africa at number one if they beat France at the Stade de France and the Springboks fail to win. It would be the first time the All Blacks sit atop the rankings since the Rugby World Cup 2019 semi-final.
This week Ireland meet a resurgent Argentina for the 20th time in Tests, 10 of which have been played in Dublin. Los Pumas have never won there before but arrive with their best-ever Rugby Championship campaign behind them and fresh from an impressive 50-17 win over Italy in Udine.
Ireland need to extend that record and beat Argentina and hope that both South Africa and New Zealand lose if they are to immediately return to number one in the world.
Back-to-back home defeats for Ireland will see them slip another place to fourth if the margin is by more than 15 points and both South Africa and New Zealand are victorious.
In this scenario Argentina will climb two places to third and make up the first all-southern hemisphere top three since 8 November, 2021 (then New Zealand, South Africa, Australia).
Ireland will drop two places for the second week running – to fifth – if they lose by more than 15 points and France repeat their Rugby World Cup 2023 opening match victory over New Zealand. This will be regardless of the England-South Africa result.
With Scotland unable to improve their rating for beating Portugal this weekend, England only need to draw at home to South Africa to displace their Calcutta Cup rivals in sixth. England cannot go any higher, though, even if they win well as the gap between themselves and Les Bleus is too large.
Australia’s forward momentum could continue this weekend, but they would need to beat Wales by more than 15 points in Cardiff and England to lose by the same margin. This would lift the Wallabies above England into seventh, but they could jump another place if Scotland also fail to beat Portugal in Edinburgh. This would see England equal their lowest-ever rating of eighth.
For Italy to recover one of the two places they lost in defeat to Argentina last weekend, they need to beat Georgia and hope that Fiji slip up against Spain.
A record 11th straight defeat for Wales will see them drop to an all-time low of 12th if avoid defeat in Italy. They cannot fall any lower, although Japan will leapfrog Samoa into 13th if they come out on top against Uruguay in France.
A big win for Georgia could even catapult them into the world’s top 10 for the first time in 21 years of the rankings.
Portugal can only improve on 15th place with a first-ever win over Scotland if Japan lose to Uruguay. A draw for Japan would need Portugal to win by more than 15 points to go to 14th.
While Portugal cannot lose any points in defeat, they could still slip from 15th if their Iberian neighbours Spain upset Fiji or USA beat Tonga by more than 15 points. Such a defeat for Tonga could see them fall another place to 19th depending on the results of teams around them.
On what must be the busiest international weekend on record, there are also 11 fixtures outside of the Autumn Nations Series that count towards the rankings. But with teams so close to one another paired up, there are multiple permutations as to might happen in terms of movement.
One thing is almost certain, though, the rankings could look very different when they are officially updated by World Rugby at midday on Monday, including potential new highs not only for Georgia but also Brazil and UAE, who play Hong Kong China and Germany respectively.
