E-mail Article Print-Friendly Version

News

Highest ranking ever for Wales

Monday 09th February 2009

Easy does it: Halfpenny touches down for Wales

Last year's Grand Slam winners Wales have climbed into the top four in the IRB World Rankings for the first time on the back of their 26-13 defeat of Scotland on the opening weekend of Six Nations 2009.

Warren Gatland's side had gone into the Murrayfield encounter in fifth, just over half a rating point behind Argentina. However the four-try win over the Scots sees them move above the Pumas with an advantage now of 0.34 points.

Wales, though, are still almost four rating points adrift of Australia in third place.

The only other climbers in the latest IRB World Rankings are Ireland, who swap places with France to move into seventh after ending a seven-match losing streak against Les Bleus with a 30-21 victory at Croke Park on Saturday.

England remain in sixth, over a point above Ireland, after beating Italy 36-11 at Twickenham on Saturday to only improve their rating by 0.12. The Italians stay eleventh, sandwiched between Fiji and Samoa.

France may have slipped one place to eighth and their lowest ever position, but they still have a cushion of almost three rating points over Scotland, who themselves edged back towards Fiji as a result of losing at home to Wales.

The resumption of the European Nations Cup, which doubles as the region's qualifying process for Rugby World Cup 2011, may not have resulted in any positional changes but Georgia, Romania and Russia have strengthened their rankings.

Defending champions Georgia ran out convincing 38-5 winners in their first ever meeting with Germany at the Fritz-Grunebaum-Sportpark in Heidelberg to improve their rating points by just five hundredths and close to within seven tenths of Tonga in 13th.

Romania kept up their impressive record against Spain by securing a 25th win in 26 meetings with a 19-10 triumph in Madrid, a result which keeps them in 17th, albeit now less than two tenths behind Japan.

Sitting one place and 1.58 rating points beneath Romania are 2008 runners up Russia, who have edged that little bit further away from USA after following up their opening victory over Spain in November with a narrow 18-14 defeat of Portugal in Lisbon.

The home losses for Spain (21st), Portugal (23rd) and Germany (26th) against higher ranked opponents did result in rating point losses, but the trio still have a cushion of at least a point over those nations directly beneath them.

IRB World Rankings
(Previous ranking in brackets)

1(1) New Zealand 92.68
2(2) South Africa 89.45
3(3) Australia 85.86
4(5) Wales 81.90
5(4) Argentina 81.56
6(6) England 80.98
7(8) Ireland 79.25
8(7) France 78.68
9(9) Scotland 75.89
10(10) Fiji 75.24
11(11) Italy 74.52
12(12) Samoa 72.57
13(13) Tonga 70.05
14(14) Georgia 69.48
15(15) Canada 69.12
16(16) Japan 68.05
17(17) Romania 67.90
18(18) Russia 65.32
19(19) USA 63.55
20(20) Uruguay 62.78

With thanks to the IRB