EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT THE 2027 RUGBY WORLD CUP AHEAD OF DRAW
Ireland will learn its fate for the 2027 Rugby World Cup as the draw takes place on Wednesday.
After the heartbreaking loss in Paris against the All Blacks over two years ago, Ireland is still looking to make it past the quarter-finals and win their first-ever knockout game at a World Cup.
The 2027 Rugby World Cup in Australia will also be the debut of a brand new 24-team format for the competition, so here’s everything you need to know.
The new format will now start with a pool stage, which will have six groups of four teams instead of four groups of five teams. Each team will play the others in their group once, meaning teams will now play a minimum of three matches instead of four, which was the case at the last World Cup.
Each group winner and each group runner-up will qualify automatically for the next stage, as well as the four best third-place sides for a new knockout round, the round of 16.
Then from there it’s the standard knockout tournament, with winners progressing to the quarter-finals, semis and then a final in Sydney. After the draw, every team will know the path they’ll have to take if they’re to reach the final.
Ireland will be in the top, now increased band of teams, along with New Zealand, South Africa, France, England and Argentina. This should hopefully mean we’ll avoid the situation at the last World Cup where the top four teams in the world were on the same side of the draw.
This new Round of 16 should see Ireland at least break the hoodoo of never winning a knockout game, with Ireland likely to at least finish in the top 2 of their pool, meaning they could have a Round of 16 tie against a third-placed team.
It all kicks off on 1 October 2027 and will run for just under 7 weeks. It will likely be the last chance for the likes of Tadhg Furlong, Bundee Aki and more legends to finally push Ireland over the quarter-final hurdle. Tickets will be on presale from February 18 2026. You can sign up for it here.
2025-12-02T14:31:35Z