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World Rugby set to scrap U20s Championship due to be hosted by Italy


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World Rugby are poised to formally announce the cancellation of this year’s Under-20 Championship due to the coronavirus outbreak. The age-grade tournament was due to take place in Italy from June 28 to July 18. 

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However, with northern Italy one of the regions hardest hit anywhere in the world by the pandemic, a decision is believed to have been taken to scrap the twelve-country tournament that was set to be played in Calvisano, Verona and Viadana.

According to rugbyrama.fr, there have been a number of meetings and telephone calls since the start of the week to establish how international rugby can move forward with a revised calendar of competitions.  

The wisest choice regarding the U20s tournament in Italy was to cancel, especially as the number of coronavirus deaths in that country rose by a daily record of 475 on Wednesday. 

French rugby boss Bernard Laporte had admitted on Tuesday: “It will be cancelled.” 

That decision will prevent France from defending the title they won last year in Argentina It will also prevent Italy from hosting this particular tournament for the third time.  

When the pool fixtures were confirmed in January, World Rugby chief Bill Beaumont had said: “Italy have proved incredible hosts in the past and we are confident rugby strongholds like Viadana, Calvisano, Verona and Parma will deliver the best possible stage for the tournament.”

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cnw 3 hours ago
France has conquered and reconquered Europe. Can it reach its Mount Everest?

It’s mind boggling that the best are not playing the best in July! Though the commercial reality bites here. On the B/C/D I think the issue is one of communicating ideas. You point out that in reality the majority of the players were third or fourth choice or perhaps worse. And the way you explained it as someone who clearly knows the French comp that makes sense. So I accept that it was perhaps a third or fourth choice team overall. I should be clear though I think that the quality of the team exceeded the sum of its parts. And I think a D grade is way too low. Their performance was too good to get such a grade. And I think that reflects that they are very good players who had a good chance to build combinations. Would the first choice players have played better - very likely. But that does not diminish the performance of the boys that played.

Put another way, I understand that the French team that played the Boks had a good number of first choice players in stark contrast to the teams that played in NZ. But they did not perform like an “A” team - clearly they had only got together just before that game. They started well but the lack of match readiness showed in the second half. In contrast the Boks had both their first choice team that was a battle hardened unit - and they played their A game, as they did against the ABs first choice team in Wellington. In contrast the first choice ABs beat the then first choice Boks in Auckland - it was the best performance all year by the ABs - it was an A grade performance (the Bok dominance in the forwards notwithstanding).



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