Rugby: what is the Autumn Nations Cup?

No All Blacks to chew on. No Wallabys or Springboks to stop. Autumn is traditionally reserved for the (lucrative) tours of the southern nations on the Old Continent. But the health crisis and the pandemic have put international rugby to a halt. It was without counting on the will of World Rugby to organize anyway meetings beyond those of the Six Nations Tournament exceptionally postponed in October after their cancellation last March.

So make way for the Autumn Nations Cup – the Autumn Nations Cup – a new eight-way competition with the six historic northern nations but also Fiji and Georgia as guest countries to come up with the numbers and form two pools of four.

In the meantime, the international window had to be widened, much to the anger of employers of internationals, namely professional clubs. Already heavily impacted in their income by the pandemic and the introduction of limited audience gauges then the closed door, the clubs signed an agreement with the French Rugby Federation at the last minute.

The agreement provides for the provision of players for the France team but for three games only. As the international window has six dates, the agreement forces coach Fabien Galthié and his staff to work a balancing act. The Dupont, Ntamack, Ollivon, Fickou and Vakatawa will play in Vannes this Sunday (4:15 p.m., France 2) against Fiji their last meeting with the XV of France before returning to their respective clubs. The coach will then have to deal with a second team for the matches against Scotland, Italy and a final classification match.