Aisle be Back: All Blacks v Italy

• By Kevin McCarthy 

I’m very confident the All Blacks can win the world cup. The 2015 World Cup, unfortunately.

After two weeks of doing nothing on an actual live rugby pitch, the 2023 iteration are thankfully finally back in the actual tournament. Not so much flying under the radar, as failing to turn on their transponder yet.

Even though the tournament seems to be moving very slow, it also moved very quickly in the last few days, as Ireland won the epic with South Africa, and Australia epically lost against Wales.

On the former, there are more theories than the shooting of JFK, including some belonging to the conspiracy fringe (the Boks are cool with losing because France will be without Dupont in the quarters).  Are Ireland now the favourites? No.  Are the Boks looking shakier? No.

Turning to the latter, we don’t need conspiracy theories. The Eddie Jones kamikaze mission was pre-destined to explode sooner rather than later.  At least the initial pleasure at seeing his ridiculous and past sell-by date posturing punctured was soon replaced by a sober assessment that where Australia goes, New Zealand may one day head if it’s not careful.

As for France, people seem to be very quick to write them off if Dupont can’t front. That may be so, but it seems to discount the huge advantage of playing at home and the fact that this is still a formidable team, and one able to match the Boks up front as Ireland largely did.

And New Zealand? Hard to know isn’t it. Italy will not be a walkover, and then Uruguay, who will be.

By then, we’ll know for sure if they are facing Ireland in the quarters.

Which loops me back to the 2015 quip. That’s probably where Ireland began their steady ascent, and the All Blacks began their steady descent.

It’s not that the All Blacks can’t win. It’s just that now they’re the team that wears the title of punching hard but having a distinctly glass jaw. Time for them to turn that around, but not much time.

Your 23 to face Italy 🖤

Samuel Whitelock is set to play his 149th Test Match on Friday night. This will make him the most capped Test player in All Blacks history 🫡#AllBlacks pic.twitter.com/9QNTMrtZfv

— All Blacks (@AllBlacks) September 27, 2023

+++++

Baseball you probably know is full of superstitions.

The most famous is that if a pitcher is pitching a perfect game, then no-one should speak of it as it is happening, otherwise it will be jinxed.

That can lead to the pitcher being left sitting, shunned, by his team-mates, as the potential feat unfolds.

So, in terms of rugby, let us acknowledge that there is a team in the lower North Island who are doing quite well this season, indeed very well.

The un-named, and not identified, team this weekend has a shot – though we won’t say it – at a perfect season in league play.

Of course, nothing is certain about this thing that isn’t happening yet. Especially as they are playing another lower North Island team of fierce repute.

So good luck, un-named team.  You’re going well – apparently, though we can’t say that.