England to enter Rugby’s sixth ever ‘Group of Death’

And so it is England who once again will take their place in a Rugby World Cup ‘group of death’. Drawn alongside 2011 finalists France and perennial World Cup dark horses Argentina in Pool C at the Kyoto State Guest House in Japan, Eddie Jones will be seeking to avoid the calamitous early exit England suffered at their home competition two years ago.

France, though not the heavyweights of yesteryear, are steadily improving season on season, while Argentina have a knack for arriving at a World Cup in their best form for four years. An interesting subtext will now be England’s summer tour to Argentina, which will inevitably take on extra emphasis, as will their meetings with the French ahead of the competition. But where exactly does the phrase ‘group of death’ come from? And how did it become so commonplace in rugby?

The ‘group of death’, one of the oldest clichés in a journalist’s handbook. A platitude of the profession, and in many ways quite a trite expression. But yet it is the unique degree of truism married with such a phrase that has seen it stand the test of time.

Originating from the 1970 football World Cup in Mexico, it was a set of Mexican sports journalists who first christened a sporting pool a ‘group of death’, or Grupo de la muerte as then reported, applying it to Group 3 which contained reigning World Cup champions England, subsequent winners Brazil and the runners-up from the 1962 Chile World Cup Czechoslovakia. Romania made up the fourth team.

In rugby union’s eight World Cups to date, five specific pools have been labelled a ‘group of death’, though its first utterance did not arise until the third edition of the sport’s showpiece in 1995.

Rugby’s first and second World Cups in 1987 and 1991 were shorn of the Springboks as a result of the international sports boycott due to apartheid, while Western Samoa, as it was then known, were controversially left off the invitation list in 1987. Consequently, no such group tag was forthcoming at either tournament.

The same Western Samoan side ignored in 1987 would sensationally go on to knock out Wales, third-place finishers in 1987, at the pool stages in 1991, beating them 16-13 in Cardiff. A result crucial to the phrase’s emergence in rugby four years later.

The marked South Africa’s first involvement, as they hosted the competition in the wake of negotiations to end apartheid. Having been drawn in Pool A alongside reigning champions Australia, as well as minnows Canada and Romania, some sections had dubbed it the ‘group of death’. Something England skipper Will Carling was not going to let lie.

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Paired with Wales’ 1991 conquerors Western Samoa, Carling insisted to Australia’s Herald Sun in May 1995 that England’s Pool B alongside the Samoans, Italy and Argentina was the true ‘group of death’, rather than the section containing the Wallabies and Springboks which had already been given that striking tag. Rugby’s relationship with the idiom was off and running.

That Samoan side of 20 odd years ago was one infinitely stronger than the one we watch today. A year out from the World Cup, they destroyed Wales 34-9 in Moamoa to back up their history defining 1991 victory over the Welsh, while at the tournament they put 42 points on Italy and 32 on Argentina. Italian and Argentinian sides England scraped by with one score victories in the same pool.

The Samoans would also travel to Dublin in November 1996 following the World Cup in 1995, and beat Ireland 40-25 at Lansdowne Road. All results unfeasible in today’s current standings. Indeed, Samoa are currently ranked 14^th in the world, behind the likes of Fiji, Japan, Georgia and Tonga. They have yet to even formally qualify for the 2019 World Cup.

Even so though, when looked at in actuality, neither Pool A nor B from the 1995 World Cup were really, truly groups of death. All four parties, South Africa, Australia, England and Western Samoa qualified for the quarter-finals and so the phrase was somewhat erroneously used in its first instance.

The next time it would rear its head would be eight years later following the draw for the 2003 World Cup in Australia.

In 1999 rugby had held its first World Cup under the banner of professionalism, and Argentina, improving all the time, had begun a trend which continues to the present of seemingly peaking just in time for each World Cup. Ireland were to be (not for the first time as it turned out) their first major victim as a quarter-final playoff against the Puma’s in Lens saw Warren Gatland’s side exit early.

Leading up to 2003, Argentina had beaten Ireland again, France twice, and an England XV, while New Zealand and South Africa had both had to sneak injury-time victories on Argentinian soil.

Accordingly, Pool A at the 2003 World Cup containing hosts and reigning champions Australia, Ireland and Argentina was widely labelled as the ‘group of death’ in the media.

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Eventual finalists Australia would comfortably see off Argentina in the opening game of the tournament in Sydney, but the two other encounters between the three nations were incredibly close affairs.

Ireland faced Argentina in their penultimate group game in Adelaide, aware that victory would confirm their passage to the knock-out stage. And courtesy of an Alan Quinlan try, for which he dislocated his shoulder while scoring, they squeaked home 16-15 to knock the Puma’s out and turn the tables from four years earlier.

The Irish would lose out by a point to Australia in a showdown for top spot a week later and face a quarter-final with France rather than Scotland, as they were duly dumped out at the quarter-final stage once again. Argentina would never again suffer a group stage exit.

Four years later and it would be same again in France for the 2007 World Cup, as the hosts were joined by a then high-flying Ireland and the exciting Argies in Pool D.

Once more it was the standout pool of difficulty, and predictably termed so via that old chestnut. You know the one by now.

Argentina had customarily peaked ahead of the tournament and played some breath-taking rugby. Laced with quality in their back division, the likes of Agustin Pichot, Juan Martin Hernandez and Felipe Contepomi had proved fearsomely difficult to handle, while young stars such as Juan Martin Fernandez Lobbe and Horacio Agulla were breaking out and making their mark.

As such, Marcelo Loffreda’s Puma’s stunned France in their opening game at the Stade de France, and would batter Ireland at the Parc des Princes in their last game to safely top the pool.

When France met Ireland in the third round of pool games, defeat for either of the pre-tournament favourites would put the other in a perilous position. France comprehensively won it and nine days later Ireland were packing their bags home.

Eddie O’Sullivan’s so-called ‘golden generation’ had come within two minutes of a Grand Slam in the previous Six Nations, and gone the Autumn unbeaten against South Africa and Australia, but alas the 2007 ‘group of death’ swallowed them whole.

Fast forward eight years and we found the hosts England and the third and fourth-placed teams from 2011, Australia and Wales in Pool A at the 2015 Rugby World Cup.

Wales slipping from the top eight seeds in the world ahead of the draw two years before the World Cup had accommodated such a situation, which Warren Gatland charmingly titled the ‘group of hell’. A variation on the theme.

England went into the World Cup talking of winning it, as is also fairly predictable and habitual, but two weeks later they were out, as a free-flowing Australia team and an injury-ravaged but spirited Welsh bunch each defeated them in Twickenham.

In doing so, England became the first host nation ever to suffer a pool stage exit in the history of the competition, with the coaching team of Stuart Lancaster, Graham Rowntree and Andy Farrell all axed following its disastrous conclusion.

And so it is onward to Japan in two years’ time, where either England will suffer unthinkable back-to-back group stage exits, France will be knocked out in the pools for the first time in their history or twice semi-finalists Argentina will buck their tournament trend and exit at that stage for the first time for 16 years. It should make for compelling viewing.

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