We have another Rugby Europe Championship on the horizon where four teams will automatically qualify for the next edition of the Rugby World Cup 2027 in Australia, as well as a place for the overall fifth place to still contest for the Webb Ellis Cup via a Final Qualification Tournament.
In short, the top two teams at the end of pool phase of the competition will get the right to show their craft ‘down under’.
However, if you wish to dig deeper and find out how the Men’s Rugby Europe Championship will work and how the eight teams competing in it can reach the coveted tournament, then please continue as there are some permutations.
Let’s start from the beginning. The Men’s Rugby Europe Championship will be held in two pools with four teams in each. Georgia, Spain, Netherlands and Switzerland will face each other in Pool A, while Portugal, Romania, Germany and Belgium will be in Pool B.
Each team will play three games in the pool phase of the Championship.
After those three rounds, the top two teams will have clinched a Championship semi-final as well as a place in Australia 2027. But don’t worry if your team finishes third or even fourth in the pool, there’s still a chance to reach the next Men’s Rugby World Cup. How?
While the four first placement sides will compete for the right to be named as the new champion, the last four will have their eyes set on finishing 5th place, which grants a slot in the upcoming World Rugby repechage tournament to be played later in the Autumn.
So, for example, for 2024’s newly promoted team, Switzerland, to qualify for that event, they will have to defeat Pool B’s third place team and then win again against the winner of the second-ranking semifinal.
As for the four qualified sides, the Championship semi-finals will hold an extra layer of importance, as the higher the final placement the better chance your team will get in the Rugby World Cup draw.
If we take the 2024 final standings, Georgia will be the Seed 1 ticket, while Portugal nº2, Spain nº3 and Romania nº4. It might not sound like a big deal, but it can be the difference between having a real chance of qualifying for the quarter-finals or falling into a juggernaut-packed pool.
It's vital to remember that any of the eight teams in the Men’s Rugby Europe Championship have a shot of making it to Australia. Belgium defeated Portugal in Mons in 2024, Germany pushed Georgia until the last minute, and the Netherlands were just a few centimetres away from getting a memorable victory over Spain. A loss in the first round might not mean much, as the bonus point system allows teams to find other paths, as Portugal did in 2024.
The stakes will be high from the get-go and will certainly drive teams to perform at a high level, with the Top 14 stars like Davit Niniashvili, Joel Merkler, Raffaele Storti, Charles-Henri Berguet, Willie du Plessis ready to help guide their countries to World Cup glory.
Each match will be a fierce contest to reach the dream, and you don’t want to miss a single minute of an action-packed Men’s Rugby Europe Championship starting on the 31st of January.
Every game will be broadcast on Rugby Europe TV, with the different broadcasters announced in due course.
By Francisco Isaac
