There are no prizes for guessing which match will attract the most attention for South African fans in the third round of the Rugby World Cup that begins on Wednesday, but it is not the Springboks or Ireland that are under the most pressure.
Instead that tag belongs to the two Castle Lager Rugby Championship nations that over the past few years have finished in the bottom two positions in that competition - Australia and Argentina.
The Wallabies have their backs to the wall after what happened to them against Fiji last Sunday, and come up this week against a Welsh team that will now feel that their own rather fortunate win over Fiji was like gold in terms of it’s worth to their challenge to get out of Pool C.
AUSSIES CAN’T AFFORD TO LOSE
Eddie Jones’s men simply cannot afford to lose if they want to survive. A loss will leave them with two defeats in three starts and Wales and Fiji will both be better placed with all the top contenders in the group having played their toughest games.
Wales week 🛠️#Wallabies #RWC2023 pic.twitter.com/DpN1kJHsOf
— Wallabies (@wallabies) September 19, 2023
It’s not quite that critical for Argentina, who play against a dangerous looking Samoa in Saint Etienne in Friday night’s game, but it just about is.
Their opening defeat to England, and failure to even pick up a bonus point in that game, leaves them looking highly vulnerable.
Although they have a game in hand as they have played only once so far, they trail England by nine points and Samoa by five and with England meeting Chile this weekend both teams will be over the hill and too far away if they win.
ACTION STARTS ON WEDNESDAY
The action starts with Italy’s clash with Uruguay in Nice on Wednesday night, while the hosts are up against Namibia on Thursday and will be looking for a similar one-sided scoreline to the one that the All Blacks achieved against South Africa’s neighbours last week.
Not that Pool A is likely to come down to any points differential count out, with both France and New Zealand really having already played the only game they went into the group phase with any chance of losing.
France, courtesy of their win over the Kiwis on the opening night, will top the group, New Zealand will be second and Italy third.
We will know which team Scotland, who play Tonga on Sunday, will be chasing in Pool B after the Boks and Ireland have faced off in what is a massive showdown between the top two ranked teams in the world.
Malcolm Marx’s recent injury may have shifted the expectation for this game ever so slightly - he was a big player for the Boks to lose.
However, the Boks were close enough while missing virtually every kick at goal when these two sides met in Dublin last November to suggest that if they are just a touch more clinical and disciplined than they were then, they could get the result that would confirm them as joint favourites with hosts France.
The @Springboks lineup to take on Ireland has landed đź‘€#RWC2023 | #RSAvIRE pic.twitter.com/elHRyN4pIu
— Rugby World Cup (@rugbyworldcup) September 19, 2023
THIRD ROUND RUGBY WORLD CUP POOL GAMES
ITALY V URUGUAY (NICE, WEDNESDAY 5:45pm)
Italy’s South African-born defence coach Marius Goosen made a good point this week when he suggested that this is the game the South American team would have targeted.
Although they did put up a fair fist of it against the hosts last week, they wouldn’t consider themselves to have a realistic chance against New Zealand or France.
 Against Italy though they may just have an outside chance if they play out of their socks and Italy are right to be wary of Uruguay after last week’s tenacious display.
Prediction: Italy by 10
FRANCE V NAMIBIA (MARSEILLE, THURSDAY 9pm)
France were more pressed by Uruguay last week than was expected and Namibia will be determined to lift their game after coming well short against New Zealand.
It would be highly optimistic though of any Namibian to expect their team to avoid the same fate they suffered against the All Blacks.
Prediction: France by around 50
ARGENTINA V SAMOA (SAINT ETIENNE, FRIDAY, 5:.45pm)
Argentina are in a different league to the South American team that Samoa beat in round two, namely Chile, but they will have to lift their game considerably from what they produced on their opening night against England if they want to be sure of picking up the win they need to keep in touch with the teams ahead of them in Pool D.
Argentina were certainly very poor against England and you can assume that their coach Michael Cheika has torn strips off them in the last two weeks in his effort to get their game right.
They’ve had almost a fortnight off and that might have been sufficient time for a correction and the right response to the abject first round disappointment.
Prediction: Argentina by 12
GEORGIA V PORTUGAL (TOULOUSE, SATURDAY, 2pm)
Portugal were competitive for an hour against Wales and on that basis their supporters have a right to feel hopeful, but Georgia should do the business against them at forward.
Prediction: Georgia by 15
ENGLAND V CHILE (LILLE, SATURDAY 5:45pm)
They won but England weren’t particularly flush against Japan last time out, with their performance being seen as a step backwards from what they achieved with 14 men in their opening game against Argentina.
England’s talkative prop Joe Marler summed up what many might have been thinking when he told the media this week that “the 2003 won the World Cup ugly so why not us?”
That’s not to say many will share his confidence that England will win the World Cup, but that he is right to say his team play ugly rugby.
His comments are actually insulting to Martin Johnson’s men - yes they won that World Cup with a Jonny Wilkinson drop-goal but they had far more going for them and entertained far more than the current England team.
But they should easily beat Chile and three wins will be enough to ensure them of quarterfinal qualification.
Prediction: England by 30
SOUTH AFRICA V IRELAND (PARIS, SATURDAY 9pm)
There’s a fear among many South Africans that an Irish win will allow the current top ranked team to dictate which other side goes through from Pool B.
They do play Scotland long after the Springboks have completed their group commitments and if they are in a position where a loss won’t impact on their own position but a Scotland win will knock out one of their most feared rivals, it might suit them not to be that committed to their final Pool game.
But if you leave the conspiracy theories aside, these two teams are both likely to advance to the quarterfinal phase regardless of Saturday’s result.
Instead, this massive game is about getting a psychological blow in ahead of a possible return later in the competition and deciding which of two difficult teams, France or New Zealand, they play in the quarterfinal.
If the Boks bring a clinical edge to their game that hasn’t always been there recently, they may just edge it.
Prediction: Boks by less than 7
SCOTLAND V TONGA (NICE, SUNDAY 5:45pm)
By the time they take the field Scotland would have seen exactly a fortnight elapse since they kicked off their campaign against South Africa in Marseille.
Will that gap work for them or will it hinder them? They weren’t really that bad against the Boks, it was just that the South Africans were better than they were, so there isn’t any real reason to anticipate an upset in this game.
Prediction: Scotland to win by 20
WALES V AUSTRALIA (LYON, SUNDAY 9pm)
His occasional odd bombastic comment aside, which is something that happens just because he can’t help himself, there is no hiding the fact that Wallaby coach Eddie Jones is using this World Cup to prepare his young charges for the next global event in four years' time, when Australia will be hosting.
The Wallabies can’t keep losing if Jones is going to keep his job until 2027, but a loss in this game will determine that the Aussie buildup for four years' time starts now.
Because they will be out of France 2023. Wales are something of an enigma so it is hard to make a prediction for this game but it is the Wallabies who have currently taken over the Welsh losing habit of a year ago.
Prediction: Wales to win a close one