Fittingly fraught finale for fantastic World Cup

PARIS : The 2023 World Cup began amid a hail of criticism for its skewed draw but, unfair as it might have appeared, that produced the greatest weekend of rugby in the tournament's history and then only the second final between the sport's two superpowers.

Over seven weeks there were incredible matches, agonising late defeats, immense bravery, amazing skill, fortitude, luck, injuries and controversies, all watched by record live and TV audiences.

Portugal and England gave stark reminders of how two totally contrasting ways to play the game can still bring results, while, as in every previous tournament, Tier Two Nations departed with a plea for more meaningful competition to avoid them being mere canon-fodder.

World Rugby addressed that with a major overhaul of the calendar they described as "the most significant development in the sport since the game went professional" but those long-suffering countries are going to have to suffer for a few years yet before they start to feel the benefits.

Rugby's shortage of truly competitive nations means that its big guns have got used to being nicely seeded, with usually only one pool containing three Tier One countries, and quarter-finals that generally have clear favourites.

That went out of the window this time as, due to a combination of COVID and the organisers' bizarre insistence that they need to know the location of teams years before the event, the draw was made on the basis of the rankings at the end of the 2019 tournament.

It meant that the top five teams in the world at the start of this event were on the same side of the draw and that three of them - Ireland, South Africa and Scotland - were in one group.

France beat New Zealand on a memorable opening night then Ireland beat