Why hasn't england france started yet? It's 10:10 . 10 minutes after ko

yeh will have galvanised the group too

It's 20 minutes in now - good game too.

France are shocking.

Samoa losing all but one of their games yet progressing to the QF is a disgrace when Ireland are out having won 2 out of their 3 games.

It's a raw deal for Ireland but it was seeded relative to opposition strength and samoa have had a tougher run than ireland.

In the last euros Portugal won the entire tournament yet barely won a game in normal time.

There isn't really a 'perfect' format though.

If you make it 'top 2 go through' for all groups you risk a weak team sneaking through at the expense of an average team who were unlucky to have Australia/NZ/England in their group.

If you split the big 3 teams up (nobody predicted Tonga to be so strong til the squad announcement which is too late to change the format) you end up with less interesting group games and the 4th group would have no big team and would be called an easy group.

The only other way is to do a 'best 2nd/3rd place teams go through' type of format, but that gets confusing and again you get complaints that some groups are easier than others.

Ireland haven’t played a tier 1 nation and lost to PNG so are out, I have no issue with that. Yes Samoa are very lucky to qualify, but they won’t make it past Austrailia.

We need to be careful what we wish for. Having 4 groups of 4 and 2 qualifying from each, with the best teams split between all groups, would leave us with uncompetitive predictable group stage, that wouldn’t be good to watch.

For the 2021 World Cup group stage I’d like to see it mixed up a little bit, with England and New Zealand going in the same group, it’s always England Australia.

I’d go for;
A - 3 qualify for quarter finals
England
New Zealand
PNG
Ireland

B - 3 qualify for quarter finals
Australia
Tonga
Samoa
Italy

C - 1 qualify for quarter finals
Wales
Fiji
Scotland
Cook Islands

D - 1 qualify for quarter finals
France
USA
Canada
Lebanon

I'd go 4 Semi finalists this year as top seeds in each group, losing QFists as second seeds in each group and the other 8 split 2 between each group with the top 2 in each group progressing......no contrived groups, just every chance the worlds top 8 teams will make the knock out stages.

..back to THIS world Cup. Depressing headlines dominating the "sports" news in New Zealand...
[urlhttps://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/league/98794616/police-warn-people-to-avoid-auckland-suburb-as-violence-erupts-after-tonga-win[/url
[urlhttp://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/343612/missiles-thrown-at-police-53-arrests-in-otahuhu[/url
[urlhttp://www.newshub.co.nz/home/new-zealand/2017/11/celebrations-and-arrests-follow-tonga-s-historic-league-win.html[/url

In terms of France's performance, it's not been the world cup they'd have been hoping for, but there's been definite improvement since the last tournament, they're still way off in terms of ability, but their attitude has been excellent.
In Kheirallah, Fages, Albert they have the makings of a great spine, Albert to me looks the best young half in the Northern Hemisphere.
Hopefully with Catalans now elite academy, and Toulouse's improvement we'll start to see more centres, and athletic forwards coming through. Mind you, if Catalans continue playing over a dozen overseas players each week they'll never get the chance.

There is definitely some fantastic talent in France, Catalans can't play all of them so I'm surprised more clubs in England haven't taken some of them on. Hull have started with Miloudi and if he can sort his attitude out then it may see us look to France a bit more