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Sports Rugby World Cup: Japan beats top favourite Ireland! 🏉

thomas

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A great Japanese victory today: the Japanese team beat Ireland ("Brave Blossoms") in the Rugby World Cup with a stunning 19:12!

Congratulations! Japan has good chances to make it to the quarterfinals!


Photo credit: AP

Stunner in Shizuoka: Japan beats No. 2-ranked Ireland 19-12 in Rugby World Cup

Japan pulled off another Rugby World Cup shock for the ages with a fearless 19-12 win over Ireland on Saturday.
www.japantimes.co.jp

And some Irish newspapers:

Woeful Ireland suffer shock World Cup defeat against Japan as Pool A is thrown wide open

Ireland came to Japan hoping to make history but this wasn't what they had in mind.
www.independent.ie

Rugby World Cup: Japan’s rising sons leave Ireland under a cloud

Host nation pull off shock victory in Shizuoka to leave Joe Schmidt’s men reeling
www.irishtimes.com

Ireland help make history but not as they planned

Joe Schmidt has always cried foul against the accusation that Ireland are dull in attack.
www.irishexaminer.com
 
Yes, I was just going through my usual morning routine, which includes a look at the BBC landing page and saw that and I confess to some surprise.

But the question I need to get an answer to is just how good was the Irish team supposed to be? I know the BBC had a bit about the Irish were expected to do well, or so I thought as I skimmed that article. But in actuality, do any of you properly attentive rugby professional fans know that the BBC has/had that right? I do see that "dull in attack" up there from some writer/editor (editor approved) at the Irish Examiner; but is that true? That would be a bummer if it is true, because it would sort of dull the bright light hanging over the Japanese team right now. Maybe down from a 100watt to a 90watt. (Old style, by the way. None of that fancy LED over rugby teams, okay?)

The other matter that had to jump into any thinking human's head is how much will this lend to supporting the idea of a psychological advantage the home team picks from just being home that then translates to the proper physical work to get the job done? If the Irish were actually considered really that high up the scale to do very well.
 
Ireland was ranked #2 in the world (behind New Zealand) before yesterday's match. Japan was ranked #9. Russia, who Japan beat less-than-decisively in their previous match, was ranked #20. By any objective measure, this was a legitimate upset. (If you think that a sportswriter being overly critical of anything less than perfection from their powerhouse team is somehow a definitive assessment of said team's abilities, I can only assume you don't follow sports much.)

The rankings and statistics are readily available here:

Men's Rankings | World Rugby

Information about the World Rugby men's rankings
www.world.rugby

Also, the idea of "home field (or home country) advantage" is nothing new to sports. You still have to play the game and execute, and I don't see any reason to diminish or downplay the excitement of the less-heralded host team defeating an Irish team that was considered a contender to go all the way.
 
I wasn't meaning to downplay the victory. Just trying to figure it all out.

I have had my moments as a sports fan in the area of watching others do it and in the team realm, as well. I've just not gotten too excited about rugby and I am also reminded of a doc many, many years ago who warned us on a particular team of a very rough sport, or art, --- that team doc told us we would pay for the activities we were doing but much later and as all youngish types tend to do we respectfully said thank you and then let that warning just slip out of our brains --- but that doc sure was right.

But I am posting to apologize if it seems I am trying to diminish a team's accomplishment.

Oh yes, and thank you for giving me those stats.

By the way, are you old enough to remember some years ago when a U.S. hockey team beat a certain group of folks from Russia --- not referred to as Russia then. That was a mighty big surprise. I forget what year that was, but it was a bit back. I think there was a home field advantage there, too. Up in New York, I think. I don't even remember if I was even in the country then. I'm getting too old.
 
Thanks for your reply, and no worries at all. I didn't mean to suggest that your post was rude or inappropriate in any way. It just struck me as somewhat...overly cynical, perhaps? Especially given that the relative rankings of Ireland and Japan seemed quite objectively clear.

(FWIW, I'm not a huge rugby follower either. Being originally from the U.S., myself, I'm obviously more familiar with baseball, basketball, and [American] football. Still, I enjoy sports in general, and can't help but get excited about World Cups and the like, even with sports I'm not as well-versed in.)

And while I'm hardly a spring chicken these days, I had not quite turned two years old when the "Miracle on Ice" (Miracle on Ice - Wikipedia) took place in Lake Placid, in the northernmost region of my home state. So while I'm very familiar with the event and its legacy, I sadly cannot claim to have been able to appreciate it in real-time.
 
My goodness, it was 1980. I had really forgotten that and now I know why. That was a tough year for me.

By the way, speaking of age and sports --- I remember when Don Shula pulled off that undefeated year and that team, who I suppose I still want to see (as a fan) winning --- that team looks so sad these days.

Yes, these world type tournaments are pretty neat to focus on even in a sport one doesn't usually follow. My problem with rugby is I still can't fully grasp the rules. It seems the field officials have too much power. But that seems to have started happening in American football, too. But that safety business is getting really popular and there may be something to that. When you are young you tend to think you're indestructible, unless you are super smart. And rugby rules seem so much looser than that of many other sports. or I just haven't studied their rule book properly and they have a fine set of rules.

Okay, I better make room for all the proper rugby fans to get in here.
 
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With respect, the search tool upper-right isn't functioning in the way the special thread about using that is indicating it should. The next manner in which I searched showed me a whole mess of JREF articles, which are fine, but this thread was never shown in the results. Kind of discouraging, if one is in a sort of hurry.

I was trying to figure out if this should be the primary thread for discussion of the world cup stuff and that long list of JREF articles, or whatever that was in that search result, gave me an impression that I should only post about this or that in a JREF article thread relevant to what I had in mind.

I don't know. Just seems confusing.

I wanted to make note of the Canada team being thrashed, if that vocabulary may be used in reference to that score I saw.

AND I thought this was a very interesting article over on the BBC where I saw that score of 60plus points to zero --- and that "zero" is really not good to see.

Still, this is quite interesting, but it doesn't relate to the topic/thread title and that is why I was looking for another thread that might be better and had all that trouble with the search tool(s) and then saw all those rugby articles.


And I am sorry that I am being unkind about all the confusion I've run into in the last 15 to 20 minutes, but I really wanted to post differently here.
 
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If Japan keep up the way they are playing, could they win the world cup?
 
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Well, I am going to place a link here for that latest JREF post about the Japan-Scotland game, but the link in that post has an interesting outline by the Kyodo news staff about what all the draws for 2 points each will do to the overall standings, and that all agreed to that before they came to Japan. It has to do with the typhoon.

Newsfeed - Rugby: Japan-Scotland decider still on, for now

TOKYO - Rugby World Cup organizers stressed Thursday that if Japan's game against Scotland cannot go ahead a... Continue reading...
jref.com

It seems to me that this thread is where the most participation has been shown by community members, so it shouldn't be frowned upon by management here that I have posted that link here. I hope.
 
Yeah indeed. What are your thoughts for tonight's game?

South-africa is a strong country but Japan beat 2 of the best teams so I think they can beat South-africa as well. Tanoshimi!
 
It was an exciting game, but the Springboks proved unstoppable right from the outset. Streams of tears now flowing in the Japanese team but congratulations to the Brave Blossoms for an outstanding performance in the World Cup!

I hope that Japan's love affair with rugby will not fade.

S African power ends Japan's run at Rugby World Cup

There was never any shortage of courage, but not even the bravest of blossoms could punch through Springbok brawn on Sunday as South Africa reached the rugby World Cup semifinals by beating Japan 26-3 and ending their dream run at their home tournament. In what was a first World Cup…
japantoday.com

ラグビー日本、南アに敗れる　３―２６　ベスト４ならず：朝日新聞デジタル

ラグビーの第９回ワールドカップ（Ｗ杯）日本大会は２０日、初の決勝トーナメント進出を果たした日本が準々決勝で南アフリカと対戦したが、３―２６で敗れた。日本はほぼベストの先発メンバーで臨んだが、前半を３…
www.asahi.com
 
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