The 2015 Rugby World Cup is underway in England and the tournament has teams like New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, France, Ireland and Italy along with the host nation looking to advance out the group stage. The match fixture schedule continues over the coming weeks and the next stage will have knockout games for the quarters and semis in October.
The tournament this year is running from September 18 to October 31 and England is hosting the tourney, with the final coming at Twickenham Stadium in London. The field is the same as 2011 apart from Uruguay, who comes in for Russia and in 2015 New Zealand is defending their title. France came in second and Australia finished third in the last tournament and those teams will be looking to win out this time around.
The pool setup has Pool A with Australia, England, Wales, Fiji and Uruguay, while Pool B has South Africa, Samoa, Scotland, Japan and the United States. Pool C has New Zealand, Argentina, Tonga, Georgia and Namibia, while Pool D has France, Ireland, Italy, Canada and Romania. The schedule for pool play goes from September 19 through the beginning of October and then things move into the knockout stage.
The quarterfinal matches start on October 17 and will have the winner of Pool B taking on the runner up of Pool A. The rest of the draw for that round will go through October 18 and then the semis will be on October 24 and October 25 at Twickenham Stadium. The third place match will be on October 30 at Olympic Stadium, while the final will be at Twickenham Stadium on October 31.
England comes in after a win against Fiji, but BBC Sport reports that the match was not as easy as expected for the host nation. The team got a bonus point in the match and now England has Wales next and that will be from Twickenham again. England is leading Pool A with five points to start, while Georgia is leading Pool C. England won 35-11 against Fiji and they have gotten lots of attention with the nation hosting the tournament.
Matches continue through the week.
Check here for the 2015 Rugby World Cup schedule and results.
