RWC 2015: What do England need to do to reach the World Cup quarter-finals after Wales beat Fiji?
England can almost guarentee themselves a place in the last-eight with a win over Australia - but defeat is not an option
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Your support makes all the difference.Wales’s 32-13 victory has put the nation on the cusp of the Rugby World Cup quarter-finals, but it is more than bad news for England.
The result puts the emphasis on this Saturday’s showdown with Australia that will decide whether they go on to reach the last-eight of the tournament which they are hosting, or if an early exit will be sealed to end a miserable campaign at the pool stages.
The 28-25 defeat to Wales last weekend has left Stuart Lancaster’s side exposed as the weakest of the ‘big three’ in Pool A, and led to a flurry of criticism aimed at the England head coach by ex-pros and members of the media.
But what do England have to do to reach the quarter-finals?
If they beat Australia:
A win over Australia would lift England above the Wallabies and put their fate in their own hands. With their final match against Uruguay expected to be a walkover, England will still have a chance at top spot given Wales and the Wallabies meet in their final match, and the resulting picture would almost certainly see England into the knockout stages.
If they lose to Australia:
Defeat is now not an option. Should Australia win, they would move to at least 13 points to join Wales’s tally, and even if England picked up a losing bonus point they would trail the pair by six points and with five available against Uruguay, they would be out of the 2015 Rugby World Cup.
The twist in the tail:
If England beat Australia but fail to score four tries, they will move to 10 points ahead of the Uruguay clash. Should they somehow fail to put four tries past Uruguay but still beat the South Americans, they would finish the pool stage on 14 points. If Australia beat Wales by scoring four tries, they would also end up on 14 points, and if Wales were to lose to the Wallabies by less than seven points they too would finish on 14 points.
The matter would then come down to points difference, and as things stand England trail massively; their modest 21-point advantage dwarfed by Australia’s 77 and Wales’s 58.
The most likely scenario:
England need to beat Australia and secure a bonus point victory over Uruguay to seal their place in the quarter-finals.
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