Having witnessed the much talked about test match in Chicago, between the United States and New Zealand, I do believe there is hope for the so called "Tier 3" nations of the world with five years to go until the Rugby World Cup takes place in Japan. There are many things in the way of these teams progression on the international stage before they'll pose a continuous threat to the likes of Wales, Ireland and France, but the first signs are there.
The teams looking at challenging for group stage qualification will be the likes of: United States, Samoa, Japan, Fiji and Canada. A few of these teams have been renowned names (for various reasons) in world rugby for a few years now, Samoa for brutal tackling, Fiji for unbelievable ball handling skills and Japan in recent years have scored some fantastic tries with pace and power. What has to be looked at now is how to bring these teams on from not only consistently qualifying for the World Cup group stages but winning games in those pools and causing teams troubles.
Firstly it has got to be getting their players more game time at the top level, be that a club or the international stage. Both hemispheres are guilty of preventing the "minnows" into their club game. It took years for Argentina to get into the (at the time) Tri-Nations even after a third place finish at a World Cup. We need to see Japanese and Pacific Island players competing in the Super 15 and American/Canadian players making themselves known either in European competitions or a competitive league must be formed on the continent. We've already seen a few players build a cult following at top level clubs in the British Isles: Manoa (USA) at Northampton Saints, Blaine Scully (USA) at Leicester Tigers and Jeff Hassler (Canada) at Ospreys. With performances like this from Tier 3 players I would find it hard to believe that professional clubs aren't scouting the deep pool that is sitting across the pond.
Speaking of the pool of players, if we looked closely at America it's obvious to see purely on a population level and the law of averages there must be some serious talent in multiple positions for the Eagles. The problem is that the young men/boys, that have natural talent that could excite the rugby world, face the general pressure to play American Football. While it is the primary sport in the nation, you can't help feeling that many players are left by the way side as coaches select who gets scholarships for college. The players who are left behind still posses extreme physical ability and obvious ball skills that could be easily transferred to a rugby pitch: Linebackers - Backrow; Quarter-backs - Fly-halves; Wide-Receivers - Wingers. And while there will obviously be a lot less funding for rugby compared to the "national sport", even a cursory glance at the levels of funding across all major sports in America will show that there is money - and lots of it - to be found for sport in America. There must be some private investor who would back a college; a professional team; or even a league.
Obviously discussions of club level development is important to develop home grown talent for the international team, but if the international team have no reason to meet up and train together on a regular basis then they'll never compete at Test level. To fix this the governing bodies of the game need to push the top teams to play more games against the developing teams, to get clubs to release the players for those games and to potentially set up a consistent competitive tournament. Seeing the "Big 3" take on the Pacific Islanders and Japan as a warm up for the Autumn Tests in Europe or for the Rugby Championship will greatly increase crowd size and interest in the sport in the nations (see 61,000 in Chicago yesterday). If the European teams faced the likes of America - and smaller cousins Canada - as their small game for the Autumn Internationals or as their warm up game for their summer tours the same result could be achieved. But perhaps a greater idea is to get these teams to make use of one another. Surely it couldn't be too difficult to set up a Pacific Rim League, between six teams: USA, Canada, Japan, Fiji, Samoa and Tonga. Time-zones could play a major hiccup but it hasn't affected the induction of Argentina to the Rugby Championship. So why can't six teams who obviously want more international exposure accommodate the International Date Line.
There a multiple reasons why none of these suggestions have happened yet: funding, player quality and IRB Test windows. Yet from the quality shown in recent years and indeed yesterday by a gusty American team way out of their depth against the world champions, it's obvious that a global sport is possible and a completely competitive World Cup is possible.
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