Even with the Rugby World Cup still 11 months away, preparations are well underway to deciding who will make the 30 man squads for the tournament. So with that in mind, all eyes with be on the Autumn Internationals for the teams from the British Isles.
Over the four weekends in November, England, Ireland, Scotland, & Wales will all lock horns not with each other, but with countries all of whom have also qualified for the World Cup in England in 2015.
The opening weekend of fixtures see the two pre tournament favourites for the cup meet at Twickenham, as England take on the reigning World Champions New Zealand. Ireland and Wales have testing starts as they take on the 2nd & 3rd ranked teams in the world – South Africa & Australia respectively, and Scotland will take on the ever-dangerous Argentinians.
If the attendances at these ‘friendly’ internationals are anything like the demand for World Cup tickets then we will be in for some superb atmospheres as the organisers of the tournament have recently stated there has been a ‘record level of demand’ for tickets, with almost 1.3 million tickets sold last month alone for the event which starts on September 18th 2015.
The Autumn Internationals start with a bang on Saturday 8th November with the following fixtures:
England v New Zealand
Wales v Australia
Ireland v South Africa
Scotland v Argentina
Click here for a full listing of fixtures