Rugby World Cup 2015 Preview: All Blacks Look To Make History In England

The 2015 Rugby World Cup kicks off Friday at London’s famed Twickenham Stadium. Here’s how NESN.com sees each of the tournament’s four pools shaking out, with the teams listed in projected order of finish.

Pool A
1. Australia
2. England
3. Wales
4. Fiji
5. Uruguay

Say hello to the Pool of Death. No. 2-ranked Australia is a tournament favorite, but the Wallabies will have to fight their way out of a stacked group that features four of the world’s top nine-ranked teams. Host nations England (No. 4) and Wales (No. 5) are coming strong performances in this year’s Six Nations tournament, with both going 4-1 to finish second and third, respectively, behind top dog Ireland. Wales will have the benefit of playing two of its World Cup matches at home in Cardiff, though its two most difficult tests — Sept. 26 vs. England and Oct. 10 vs. Australia — will come at London’s Twickenham Stadium.

Pool B
1. South Africa
2. Samoa
3. Scotland
4. United States
5. Japan

The battle in Pool B will be for second place, as No. 3-ranked South Africa should advance through to the knockout round with relative ease. That means the Oct. 10 matchup between Samoa and Scotland — the final opening-round game for both teams — should be a wild one. Scotland was throttled in Six Nations play earlier this year, losing all five matches, while Samoa earned a second-place finish in this summer’s Pacific Nations Cup, beating both the U.S. and Japan in the process. And while the U.S.’s sevens side should contend for an Olympic medal next summer at Rio 2016, its 15s counterpart still is far from international relevance. Two wins in pool play would be cause for celebration for the Eagles.

Pool C
1. New Zealand
2. Argentina
3. Tonga
4. Georgia
5. Namibia

The defending champion and top-ranked All Blacks should have by far the easiest road to the knockout stage, and they’ve been pegged as 5-4 favorites to become the first team to win consecutive World Cups. New Zealand owns a 24-0-1 all-time record against the two teams that’ll battle for second place in the pool — Argentina and Tonga — with the draw coming 30 years ago against the Pumas. Argentina fell to New Zealand 39-18 in the 2015 Rugby Championship this past July but did rebound to earn its first-ever victory over South Africa a month later.

Pool D
1. France
2. Ireland
3. Italy
4. Romania
5. Canada

France advanced all the way to the final of the 2011 World Cup before losing an 8-7 heartbreaker to New Zealand. Les Bleus shouldn’t see much resistance in pool play, nor should Ireland, which has never advanced past the quarterfinals in a World Cup but enters this one ranked sixth in the world after winning each of the last two Six Nations tournaments. The Irish struggled in their World Cup tuneups, however, losing to Wales on Aug. 29 and England on Sept. 5. Still, the gap between those two squads and the other three is significant.