What sort of help does World Rugby give to the nations who did not make it out of the pool stage at Rugby World Cup 2023?

“It’s still going. We just ran a pool phase hot debrief, which is where we bring in all the consultants and the staff to unpack what’s happened in the pool phases. It’s very helpful because it gives an understanding of where the unions are, what were their performance barriers but also what were their performance enablers. That’s the first initial phase.

“During the World Cup we’ve got 12 unions that have been involved in an independent research programme. All players, assistant staff and the coaching group have got a two-piece survey. They do it on their phone pre-pool phase, so in your preparation phase, and then at the end of the pool phase. All that data at a collection point gives us the information from the unions, but it gives us a trend across all the 12 unions that we’re working with. That then helps WR and the unions plan through into the next cycle.

“We’ve taken a few high performance unions to not only help them to analyse and review their own programmes but it gives us a benchmark - what is the performance gap and how do we actually bridge that?

“We do a cold debrief in Australia in December. There’s a huge amount of data points across all those countries, and it takes into consideration things like: 'Did I understand the style of play that I was playing? Did I understand the game plan? Did I feel ready? Was I prepared to go to this World Cup?'

“That information leads to our next cycle and how we plan out our next four-year cycle. We did that in the women’s game in 2022, we did all 12 unions.

“When we reviewed 2019, one of the findings was we needed to create franchises across the unions. That was achieved. We needed to improve the total number of fixtures in the lead-up and genuine warm-ups. This is the largest number of warm-up fixtures we’ve done ever with 32 for the performance unions coming into this World Cup. That was all worked through in partnership with the unions and aligning them with high performance unions.

“The next cycle we’ll come up with a whole bunch of new recommendations, but we’re going have to keep the other ones going. It’s an additive process."

How much satisfaction does it give you to see a team like Fiji qualify for the quarter-finals and a team like Portugal claim a historic victory at Rugby World Cup 2023?

“It’s a fantastic achievement for both Fiji and Portugal and it is humbling to see so many players that have been developed in the unions’ pathways performing on the world stage.

“There’s also a large number that have come through from pathway to World Rugby Combine, from World Rugby Combine to the player placement programme. We’ve been running that for a while now. We run one in the US as well, and it’s really encouraging - the connectivity of the player who was projected and has now gone on to bigger and better things. It’s incredibly satisfying and humbling at the same time to be part of the process.  

“You see the Chileans that have all come to support Chile in its inaugural campaign. What a great story, it’s really opened a whole new fanbase. 

“I was at the Chile versus Samoa game in Bordeaux. Unbelievable, the national anthems. They bring a totally new element to the game in terms of support. It’s fantastic. The Portuguese in Toulouse - that felt like it should have been Lisbon. Full credit to all those unions."

How difficult has it been for some of the smaller nations in this Rugby World Cup cycle given the pandemic?

“This World Cup cycle has been truncated because of Covid, so you’ve got a lot of teams that have been trying to force four years of preparations - in Namibia’s case - into 12 months.

“There were some highlights, like Georgia was able to keep some consistency. The Autumn Nations Series came online and Georgia and Fiji were invited. Unfortunately, the Fijians contracted Covid and they only played one game against the Georgians.

“Many countries just closed down - Namibia closed all contact sports - but then there’s really good stories like in South America where they continued operating by creating bubbles.

“For the players it would probably have been very tough because they were away, not only test windows, in bubbles in Chile and Uruguay, but they played the SLAR (Superliga Americana de Rugby or Super Rugby Americas) at the time. So they’ve been able to put together, within the limitations of what was happening, a programme to keep rugby operational and I think that shows.”

Tell us about the new La Vila Cup tournament that’s been announced for November between Spain, Brazil, USA and Canada

“In a World Cup year many teams that don’t qualify don’t play enough rugby. Not having any fixtures when you would historically play is not setting you up to be a performing union come 2027. What we have done is to try and enable those unions to have content in 2023 by creating this competition.

“It’s a fantastic achievement for Spain, they’ve got a couple of fixtures, for the US to continue its development, for Canada to finish off the year after playing Tonga and the Pacific Islands. Canada and the US have been good for us to help prepare teams as we’ve toured them arounds the islands and also into Europe. They were all part of a preparation phase not only for the World Cup but also to keep their development ongoing.

“This gives Brazil, as another team in South America, an opportunity to grow and Spain to pick up some fixtures which they would not historically have had.

“This is an important competition on the road to 2027 and the development in the age-grade talent that is coming through."

How good is it to see rugby develop in Spain?

“Spain have qualified for the World Rugby U20 World Championship which is fantastic. They won the trophy. They’ve set up three new academies which is also to accelerate the development of the talent in the country.

“Men and women’s, sevens are also a focus for Spain. They’ve got a big final in sevens to deliver in Madrid and they’ve got some big ambition. I look forward to seeing Spain as a union that is already there, but genuinely manifesting to where it should be. It’s a good outcome.”