A mixed bag of results ... and Chic Rugby is coming 2nd in her tipping group - still.

Who'd have thought the Canadians would tie with the Japanese?

Not Chic Rugby and hence her performance in her Facebook tipping competition isn't so hot this week. I'm 6 points behind my pal Reece, because I didn't pick a 12-all tie between the Canucks and the Cherry Blossoms. Grrr.

In other games the Samoans beat the USA for their first win of the RWC, the Georgians thrashed Namibia 30 nil and the Romanians just beat the Portuguese (picked that one - phew!).

The next match of interest will be the Poms against the Tongans. I've picked the English to win but not by much (less than 12 points). We'll see.

Not much longer now - 7 matches - til the knock-out rounds begin. Australia will most likely play England in the Quarters, unless the Tongans beat them, and then we'll play the Tongans instead!

Go Tonga!

Wales and France victorious, and the poor Irish and Japanese vanquished.

The men in green went down to the French 25 - 3 in Saint-Denis. Apparently the Irish played a dispirited and disjointed game and conceded 11 penalties, 5 of which the French successfully converted into points. Les Bleus will be relieved and their passage now through to the quarters is assured with their last match to be against the Georgians on the 26th.

The Welsh crushed my minnow faves the Cherry Blossoms 72 -18. The Dragons enjoyed the home-ground advantage playing in Cardiff; however, the Japanese made an impressive 138 tackles, so they didn't go down without a fight. In fact, at half-time, they only trailed 29 - 11. I love the Cherry Blossoms - they know they're not in the big leagues but they play with heart and passion. They're cute too :-)

Their match against Canada will be the last chance we'll have to see them play in the Cup. Go Japan!

No big surprises in the latest matches at the RWC.

The Tongans, Fijians and Italians all defeated their oppositions in the latest games in the RWC.

The Fijians faced an especially tough and spirited Japan in their match. A good game for these two minnow nations.

Gotta love the hair on this Tongan player!

	USA	15-25	TGA		Montpellier
	JPN	31-35	FJI		Toulouse
	ITA	24-18	ROM		Marseille

Big wins to the Wallabies and the All Blacks!

ChicRugby and ChicRugby's friend Cat stayed up last night to watch the Wallabies v Japanese and the All Blacks v Italians.

Actually we drank champagne and chatted during the All Blacks game. I could see Dan kicking away, with my peripheral vision, but we had other things to talk about and we got distracted ...

No matter. The upshot is that this morning both the Australians and the All Blacks are sitting nicely at the tops of their pools with cricket scores against their names - excellent. I pity the poor Cherry Blossoms; they got hammered. They continued attacking as best they could but tiredness and the superior fitness of the Wallabies wore them down in the second half. Rocky Elsom played very well and scored the fastest hat-trick by a forward in the Cup's history. The Wallabies scored 13 tries!

The All Black match just seemed to feature Dan kicking a lot. The New Zealanders scored 11 tries.

Very tired this morning (I fell asleep on Cat's sofa) and am thinking that coffee will be my best friend until the 20 October.

Oh, and the English won as well - but we don't care about them.

Picking a 'rugby minnows' team to support during the RWC ....

It's customary during the Rugby World Cup to pick a 'minnows' team to support ... you know, one of those countries that 'play' rugby but really have lots of expats in their teams or add colour to the Cup but not a lot of competition.

I'm quite liking the Japanese team. The Cherry Blossoms will play in Pool B with the Wallabies, the Canadians, the Welsh and the Fijians. They probably rank in playing status with the Canadians (a quarter-final spot as their best placing) but they do carry the distinction of fielding the number one try scorer in the game today, Daisuke Ohata. That's him on the right with Kiwi-born Andy Miller. He's scored 69 tries for his nation's team, 5 more than former record-holder David Campese.

Other minnows include the USA, Tonga, Romania, Portgual, Georgia and Namibia (the Wallabies once beat them 142 - nil). Out of these teams only the USA really has any chance of making it out of the pool rounds, although the Tongans play an entertaining game and supply a lot of players to other Southern Hemisphere teams (like the Fijians).

So, choose a minnow to support and add some fun to your Cup as well as some support to these teams' fan bases.

Go the Blossoms (even their nickname is nice :-)) !