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Big rankings prize for Fiji men if they pull off historic win
By Jon Newcombe
As the teams involved in the first round of the Autumn Nations Series, England, New Zealand, Scotland and Fiji all have a chance to steal a march on their rivals by picking up valuable World Rugby Rankings points this weekend.
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England and New Zealand get Saturday’s double-header underway at Allianz Stadium in Twickenham, kick-off 15:10pm (GMT), before Scotland welcome Fiji back to Murrayfield for the first time since 2022 in the early evening 17:40pm kick-off slot.
With the draw for Rugby World Cup 2027 just over a year away, the jockeying for rankings positions is about to start in earnest and, for Fiji, a good set of results against Six Nations teams, Scotland, Wales and Ireland – while avoiding a slip-up against Spain in their third match – would come as a significant boost to their chances of a good seeding.
Taking Saturday’s game in Edinburgh for starters, Fiji will move above Scotland in the rankings if they manage to do what they have failed to do on six occasions in the past, and beat them at Murrayfield.
Fiji have achieved the status of being the higher-ranked team before, as recently as October last year when they made the quarter-finals of Rugby World Cup 2023 and Scotland didn’t.
But other than that the instances where they have been above Scotland in the rankings have been relatively rare. The only previous time in the last eight years was for a brief three-week period in February 2016, when Fiji were 10th and Scotland 11th.
Whilst Fiji stand to gain two places, Scotland cannot leapfrog any of the teams ahead of them if they win, regardless of the scoreline or the result of the preceding match in Twickenham.
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A defeat, though, would see them slip a place, to eighth.
As for England and New Zealand, neither team can improve on their respective positions of fifth and third.
But a defeat of more than 15 points will cost England fifth place, with Argentina replacing them there for their highest position in over eight years.
Los Pumas were last ranked fifth, which is two places off their all-time best, in June 2016, on the back of a home win against France.
Elsewhere, Switzerland and Sweden can set new records. Both are currently at an all-time high of 26th and 32nd, but wins over Belgium and Lithuania in their respective matches, would see them enter previously uncharted territory.
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