Yeah, damn straight. It's a hard choice. On basic principle, I'd rather be #1 year after year, but all the attention and hype that goes into the World Cup gives it a meaningfulness that #1 doesn't have. At the end of the day, though, what I know is that we have a positive win record against every country on earth (the only close one being against South Africa) and we're clearly the single best rugby country, both today and historically. World Cups just have a nice way of showing us that we do have bad days sometimes.
I was thinking of a more interesting way to decide the world champion. Three years are just played as normal, and then the top eight in the world play each other in the fourth year, throughout the year in a series of home and away games - 14 total for each, the same amount the All Blacks play in a normal year and the Bledisloe, Tri-Nations, and possible grand slam all work nicely into that. Whoever has the most points at the end of that year is crowned world champions. Probably will never happen for the simple reason New Zealand would be the only country who'd ever win it.
We'll lose it. The pressure will be far too immense.
(Yes, yes, I know this is traditional Kiwi "you lost one game, I'm writing you off for the next four years" shit, but ... well, when was the last time we won the Cup? Exactly.)
One thing we urgently need next Cup is a competitive group. That's what I think gave France the final edge over us this time around. Now that it's our tournament, let's manufacture something favourable. ;)
I was thinking of a more interesting way to decide the world champion. Three years are just played as normal, and then the top eight in the world play each other in the fourth year, throughout the year in a series of home and away games - 14 total for each, the same amount the All Blacks play in a normal year and the Bledisloe, Tri-Nations, and possible grand slam all work nicely into that. Whoever has the most points at the end of that year is crowned world champions. Probably will never happen for the simple reason New Zealand would be the only country who'd ever win it.
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(Yes, yes, I know this is traditional Kiwi "you lost one game, I'm writing you off for the next four years" shit, but ... well, when was the last time we won the Cup? Exactly.)
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One thing we urgently need next Cup is a competitive group. That's what I think gave France the final edge over us this time around. Now that it's our tournament, let's manufacture something favourable. ;)
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