Welcome to Day 9 of FRG’s Fantasy Rugby World Cup Diary! A daily post during the World Cup in which I will be previewing the upcoming games, looking back at the previous matches and sharing the progress, trials and tribulations of all my teams across the 4 games live for the World Cup…
Match Day 8 Review
A monumental day in RWC history kicked off with Argentina v Tonga. Argentina got off to a flying start with a notable first half hat trick fron Julian Montoya, but things fizzled out in the second half somewhat. In the end Argentina stifled a spirited fightback from Tonga and came away with the win. From a fantasy perspective, there were two standout performances, the aforementioned Montoya, who scored a first half hat-trick and was promptly hauled off at the start of the secind half (suggesting a starting spot against England?) and Tonga’s Telusa Veainu, who bagged a couple of tries and beat 9 defenders on the way, form that fans of Leicester Tigers will be delighted to see no doubt!
This was followed by a truly historic match-up between Japan and Ireland. Japan stunned Ireland with an outstanding second half performance and took away the win to top Pool A. Standout players in a team full of heroes for Japan included James Moore, Kizuki Himeno, Michael Leitch and Kenki Fukuoka. After a promising first 30 minutes Ireland faded, however there were some good performances from a fantasy perspective by Garry Ringrose and James Ryan.
Finally there was the Southern African derby match between South Africa and Namibia, which ended up as a procession with South Africa racking up the biggest win of the tournament so far. Many South African players got amongst the fantasy points on offer, those in and amongst the points included the tryscorers, Mbongeni Mbonambi (x2), Makazole Mapimpi (x2), Francois Louw, Lukhanyo Am, Warrick Gelant, Siya Kolisi and Schalk Brits with Elton Jantjies contributing with 6 successful kicks.
Match Day 9 Preview
Two games tomorrow; first up at Kumagaya, Georgia take on the architects of one of the tournament’s biggest shocks so far, Uruguay. Despite Uruguay’s heroics against Fiji, the short turnaround may be too much and many are expecting Georgia to gain a convincing win. Players worth keeping an eye on include Santiago Arata and Juan Manuel Cat for Uruguay and Jaba Bregvadze and Zurab Dzneladze for Georgia.
Game 2 is a blockbuster clash in Tokyo with Wales taking on Australia. This should be a tight affair that should determine the winners of Pool D, and the bookies are predicting a close win for Wales. Both teams are locked and loaded with their first choices and so there is talent everywhere you look. Those I’ll be watching closely from a fantasy perspective include Samu Kerevi, Marika Koroibete and Michael Hooper for Australia and Liam Williams, Gareth Davies and Justin Tipuric for Wales.
FRG’s Teams
The Rugby Magazine – Points: 810 – Ranking: 244
A solid day with a lot of players playing but nobody scoring particularly highly, I had Petti (C), E Jantjies (K), Murray, Furlong, Stockdale, Carreras and Boffelli starting, with Leitch, Tamura and Matsushima on my bench and through sheer volume, I’ve gone up a few places.
Tomorrow I’ll have some benched Georgian players hopefully making an appearance before it is time to reset for Gameweek 3. I have 3 squad spots left and they will all be filled by All Blacks when their team is announced on Monday.
SuperBru – Points: 439 – Ranking: 7,011
A brilliant day with big scores from Mapimpi (C) and Montoya, with solid support roles from E. Jantjies (K), Murray, Himeno, Petti & Ryan. Looking forward to seeing the effect in my overall ranking. Tomorrow I’ll have Kerevi and Ala’alatoa playing, and that will be my team done for Round 2.
The Daily Telegraph – Points: 692 – Ranking: 338
A decent day today with Mapimpi as captain and a great score for Garry Ringrose. I had a few other players including Nkosi, Jantjies, Moroni, Stockdale, Stander and Furlong, but none of them scored particularly highly. Tomorrow I won’t be making any subs, but I still will have appearances from North, Kerevi, Gareth Davies and Ala’alatoa and I’m strongly considering passing the captains armband to Samu Kerevi.
The Irish Times – Points: 518 – Ranking: 901
5 decent scores today with captain Earls, Ringrose, Furlong, Leitch, Kolisi and Inagaki. Just two players on tomorrow, Alun Wyn Jones and Gareth Davies.
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Get free tickets to The Rugby Show
The Rugby Show is a two-day gathering at the Ricoh Arena, home of Wasps, in July 2020. The Rugby Show already has a fantastic range of phenomenal speakers from across the professional game. The likes of Lawrence Dallaglio, Maggie Alphonsi, current England World Cup duo, Joe Marler and George Kruis and World Cup winner Sarah Hunter will be talking about their own experiences, about coping with injury, maintaining fitness, nutrition, providing demonstrations on how to improve your skills as a player and more. The line-up also includes recent MMA convert James Haskell, Premiership regulars Jimmy Gopperth and Tommy Taylor to name a few. Registration has now gone live and as an ambassador of the Rugby Show, Fantasy Rugby Geek is offering you FREE ENTRY to the event (which usually costs £15 for an adult ticket). Click this link https://the-rugby-show-2020.reg.buzz/fantasy-rugby-geek and enter the following code TRS20GRASSROOTS to book your FREE tickets now!
Looking for more Fantasy Rugby insight and Resources?
New for the 2019/20 season, we are proud to present the The Fantasy Rugby Handbook. An exhaustive collection of wisdom and experience gained from over a decade of fantasy rugby playing. Primarily aimed at less experienced players but with enough nuggets of wisdom and insight for even the most grizzled fantasy rugby veteran. There is something here for all players. The eBook is available to download now for just £3.99 on Gumroad as a PDF and on Amazon in Kindle format (Free on Kindle Unlimited) – check it out!
If you want some more sources to help you finalise your decisions, go to our resources page where you’ll find all the 2019 Rugby World Cup fantasy games, all the stats sources, injury news, team news, fantasy relevant rugby betting odds and tons of other useful information.
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