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RLWC2025 qualifying announced


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In the men’s competition, Asia Pacific will have between 5 and 7 berths, Europe will have 6 to 8, Americas will have 2 and Middle East Africa will have 1 or 2.

This paragraph suggests we will be seeing quite a few repechage matches across continents, which I look forward to seeing!

https://www.intrl.sport/news/international-rugby-league-announces-qualification-places-for-france-2025/

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17 minutes ago, theswanmcr said:

Good to have things confirmed but disappointing that all quarter finalists will qualify for France… this hinted otherwise recently https://www.theguardian.com/sport/no-helmets-required/2022/jan/19/france-2025-rugby-league-world-cup-england

Indeed, I’d prefer it to be semi finalists, though having that instead of QFs might mean some ridiculous mis-matches in qualifying - England v Serbia, Tonga v Solomon Islands etc. 

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Given where we are with our international development, I see no advantage to putting the top 8 or so nations through qualifying - it would result in pointless mismatches and also eat into the possibility of some big series in the next couple of years. 

In fact as soon as this autumn's tournament is out of the way, we need to take advantage of the fact that we already know half the teams, conduct a draw, and set dates and locations. If you want big numbers travelling from the UK, people need a lot of notice, so let's get to it.  

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12 minutes ago, Toby Chopra said:

Given where we are with our international development, I see no advantage to putting the top 8 or so nations through qualifying - it would result in pointless mismatches and also eat into the possibility of some big series in the next couple of years. 

In fact as soon as this autumn's tournament is out of the way, we need to take advantage of the fact that we already know half the teams, conduct a draw, and set dates and locations. If you want big numbers travelling from the UK, people need a lot of notice, so let's get to it.  

Yes both you and Eddie make good points. We are where we are at the minute and with only 3 years to go too it does make practical and logistical sense.

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8 quarter-finalists plus 27 potential qualifiers. Totalling 35

Will try and list who this may be. 

1-16:

World Cup Nations

19:

Affiliate and Full IRL Members

Czechia, Germany, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Russia*, Serbia, Spain, Turkey, Ukraine*

Cameron, Ghana, Morocco, Nigeria, South Africa 

Brazil, Canada, Chile, USA

* as you can imagine, a tricky situation. 

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Quarter finalists is fine as it is. There’s no real point right know on cutting that down to four but it’s something you would hope is on the agenda. 

You’ve got to think, right now, it will be England, Samoa, Australia, Fiji, New Zealand, Ireland/Lebanon, Tonga and PNG to be the quarter finalists and qualifiers for 2025, which leaves two very good Four Nations competitions between England, Australia, New Zealand and Tonga and Fiji, Ireland/Lebanon, Samoa and PNG which can fill one of the years between this year and the 2025 tournament. 

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Being a bit more serious, the current World Rankings are 

https://www.intrl.sport/world-rankings/

Assuming that the QFs from this year will be Australia, NZ, England. France, Tonga, Fiji, Samoa and Lebanon.

Then the 6-8 European teams, as per rankings, might be: Ireland, Scotland, Serbia, Greece, Netherlands, Malta, Italy, Czech Republic (One assumes Wales will rise up the rankings)

Asia/|Pacific (5-7 berths) Papua New Guinea, Cook Islands, Philippines, Solomon Islands, then we are struggling

Americas: USA, (2 berths)  Canada, Jamaica, USA

Middle East / Africa (1-2) Nigeria, Ghana

Something like that...

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I think the eight quarter finalists qualifying works.

I'd like to see a nations league style pathway for new countries to the sport so they can grow. E.g. in Europe having promotion and relegation from a top league played annually between the top four countries.

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1 hour ago, welshmagpie said:

Czechia, Germany, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Russia*, Serbia, Spain, Turkey, Ukraine*

Cameron, Ghana, Morocco, Nigeria, South Africa 

Brazil, Canada, Chile, USA

* as you can imagine, a tricky situation. 

Turkey, Malta and the Czechs are already officially eliminated as Euro Group D was the start of the European qualifiers. Netherlands won, so they go onto the next round, which I am guessing they will join Norway and Germany in Group C, with only the winner proceeding to the next round. 

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Regarding automatic qualifying, I am a bit torn. Part of me wishes all nations were forced to qualify. I would love to see NRL's top players rolling into town in places like PNG, Fiji and Tonga. It actually really irritates me that Tonga have not played a game in Tonga for 25-30 years (I have been searching high and low and cannot find an exact date). 

Similarly in Europe, if the full England team played in Belgrade and brought a few hundred fans and some media attention with them, it can only be a good thing for the game in Serbia. 

But then of course, we run the risk of the tier one nations sending their U18 team and not taking the games seriously at all. 

I also don't like it because a team can change so much in 4 years. For example, I can see Lebanon and Italy being considerably weaker this year than they were in 2017. 

That being said, probably leave it as is for now, but I hope in the future they can slowly reduce the number of automatically qualified teams. 

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6 hours ago, welshmagpie said:

8 quarter-finalists plus 27 potential qualifiers. Totalling 35

Will try and list who this may be. 

1-16:

World Cup Nations

19:

Affiliate and Full IRL Members

Czechia, Germany, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Russia*, Serbia, Spain, Turkey, Ukraine*

Cameron, Ghana, Morocco, Nigeria, South Africa 

Brazil, Canada, Chile, USA

* as you can imagine, a tricky situation. 

You mean me?, or David, the former P.M.?

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I think the following nations will feature in RLWC 2025:

Asia Pacific: Australia, New Zealand, Tonga, Samoa, Fiji, Papua New Guinea and Cook Islands.

Europe: England, France, Ireland, Italy, Wales, Scotland, Greece and Serbia.

Americas: United States and Jamaica

MEA: Lebanon and Morroco (if they bring over their french based players in the qualifiers on September).

I'm sure there'll be at least one or two changes to this list especially in Europe, if some heritage players in the NRL and Superleague decide to take the field in the qualifiers.

 

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5 hours ago, Jim from Oz said:

Surely France automatically qualify, so if they don't make the 2021(22) RLWC q/f, then 9 will go through as having qualified at the end of this year's RLWC

Yes, it is literally the first thing mentioned in the article. 

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6 hours ago, Waghi Tumbe said:

I think the following nations will feature in RLWC 2025:

Asia Pacific: Australia, New Zealand, Tonga, Samoa, Fiji, Papua New Guinea and Cook Islands.

Europe: England, France, Ireland, Italy, Wales, Scotland, Greece and Serbia.

Americas: United States and Jamaica

MEA: Lebanon and Morroco (if they bring over their french based players in the qualifiers on September).

I'm sure there'll be at least one or two changes to this list especially in Europe, if some heritage players in the NRL and Superleague decide to take the field in the qualifiers.

 

You’ve got 19 countries there when it will be 16 teams 😉

I think we should have lost 1 or 2 spots in Europe and definitely guaranteed MEA two. Hard to tell exactly but reads as if it will be Lebanon (if they make the quarters this time) and then anyone else will have to play-off. Likelihood is they will get beat there - unless like you say Morroco field their French contingent.

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13 hours ago, paulwalker71 said:

Being a bit more serious, the current World Rankings are 

https://www.intrl.sport/world-rankings/

Assuming that the QFs from this year will be Australia, NZ, England. France, Tonga, Fiji, Samoa and Lebanon.

Then the 6-8 European teams, as per rankings, might be: Ireland, Scotland, Serbia, Greece, Netherlands, Malta, Italy, Czech Republic (One assumes Wales will rise up the rankings)

Asia/|Pacific (5-7 berths) Papua New Guinea, Cook Islands, Philippines, Solomon Islands, then we are struggling

Americas: USA, (2 berths)  Canada, Jamaica, USA

Middle East / Africa (1-2) Nigeria, Ghana

Something like that...

I think you've misunderstood. Those 'berths' are for the 16 places at the WC and will include all 8 Q-finalists from 2022. The other 8 berths will come from 27 countries that have to qualify.

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12 hours ago, langpark said:

Turkey, Malta and the Czechs are already officially eliminated as Euro Group D was the start of the European qualifiers. Netherlands won, so they go onto the next round, which I am guessing they will join Norway and Germany in Group C, with only the winner proceeding to the next round. 

Interesting. That's a very early start. Worth pointing out that those three nations may well be counted among the 27 involved in the qualifying process.

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8 hours ago, Waghi Tumbe said:

I think the following nations will feature in RLWC 2025:

Asia Pacific: Australia, New Zealand, Tonga, Samoa, Fiji, Papua New Guinea and Cook Islands.

Europe: England, France, Ireland, Italy, Wales, Scotland, Greece and Serbia.

Americas: United States and Jamaica

MEA: Lebanon and Morroco (if they bring over their french based players in the qualifiers on September).

I'm sure there'll be at least one or two changes to this list especially in Europe, if some heritage players in the NRL and Superleague decide to take the field in the qualifiers.

 

I’d have Nigeria over Morocco. They have a lot of players in sl and a couple in the NRL 

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2 hours ago, marklaspalmas said:

Interesting. That's a very early start. Worth pointing out that those three nations may well be counted among the 27 involved in the qualifying process.

Correct. Early indeed, but let's not forget, there are far more nations involved now. Plus, for RLWC2021, all teams had qualified by the end of 2019. Something I personally do not like, I believe the team we see at WC should be as close as possible to the one that got them there. Whereas a lot of teams can change significantly in 2-4 years.

However, given what happened with covid in 2020, it worked out well in the end. 

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14 hours ago, langpark said:

Regarding automatic qualifying, I am a bit torn. Part of me wishes all nations were forced to qualify. I would love to see NRL's top players rolling into town in places like PNG, Fiji and Tonga. It actually really irritates me that Tonga have not played a game in Tonga for 25-30 years (I have been searching high and low and cannot find an exact date).

I can help you there, https://www.rugbyleagueproject.org/teams/tonga/results.html.  It looks like it was in 2006 against Fiji.

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4 minutes ago, Big Picture said:

I can help you there, https://www.rugbyleagueproject.org/teams/tonga/results.html.  It looks like it was in 2006 against Fiji.

Thanks for that, great resource! Actually 2007 according to the link you sent. 

https://www.rugbyleagueproject.org/matches/dates/19-october-2007/tonga-vs-fiji.html 

Still, 15 years is a helluva long time!!

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