There are valid questions to be asked about the integrity of the Nations Championship and the logic of introducing a competition that in the southern hemisphere leg played in July saw some teams have to put in way too much travel and others forced to play home games far from home.
Fiji playing a home game against England at Liverpool was ridiculous, while England having to travel to South Africa for their first game then back to England before heading to Argentina for their last game of that leg was equally so.
Talk about being wary of carbon footprint, clearly World Rugby doesn’t care about that.
Other teams had equally tough travel loads. Ireland, based in Australia, refused to divert to Japan for their game against that nation and the game was played in Australia before the Irish headed further south for their final game against New Zealand.
Scotland, when they were in Pretoria to play the Boks, were halfway through their return from Argentina, where they played the first game, to their last game - which was at home in Edinburgh against Fiji.
Yes, Fiji are a southern hemisphere nation, but they played all their games in the north.
Wales started against Fiji - yes, them again, they played all their away games at someone else’s home ground - and then headed to Argentina before doubling back to South Africa for their game against the Springboks in Durban before heading home.
The point of introducing the Championship was to give more meaning to the international games played in the July window, but when that was dreamed up there clearly wasn’t much thought given to the hoops that would have to be jumped through.
TRAVEL NOT A FACTOR IN NORTHERN LEG
As we head into the northern leg of the competition, the travel is not as lopsided.
There’s no team scheduled to go back to the other hemisphere to play a game before heading in the other direction again.
Fiji, coached now by Jake White, open against France in France. This time it is an official away game for them, so that’s okay.
It is just a pity that when they played the southern leg in July all their games were also in the north.
By now anyone with the ability to even spell the word logic should see why the integrity of the competition should be questioned.
Just as there should also be questions on what ring fencing the top 12 nations into this competition does to develop the other 12 who will also be part of next year’s expanded 24-man World Cup in Australia.
So World Rugby will have to forgive those who are still lukewarm towards the tournament, and who argue that three-match series, or two-atch series plus one game against a nation like Portugal or Spain, have enough relevance on their own.
So creating a competition and title is unnecessary.
Ireland celebrated their series win in New Zealand in 2022 as an historic event, just as they did their first ever win on South African soil at the start of the three-match series here in 2016.
Ditto Wales that middle test of the 2022 series here when they won in Bloemfontein in what was their first ever triumph on SA soil.
Those teams got a proper tour experience, as did their travelling fans, and felt when they returned home that they’d conquered a foreign land.
Which was surely a more memorable adrenaline hit for them than is likely to come their way when they finish as also-rans, which they are likely to, in a competition made up of one-off games.
CHASING POINTS DIFFERENTIAL WILL RATCHET INTENSITY AND INTEREST
Some question the integrity of the competition on the basis that it pits north against south and if one hemisphere is dominant, which the south has been up to now, then the two best teams don’t play in the main final.
It is a fair point, but then it also misses the point of the Nations Championship - it isn’t supposed to be another World Cup, it is just an attempt to give more meaning to fixtures, that in the November portion at least, would have been played anyway.
South Africa and New Zealand top the southern pool and one of them will make the final and one will miss out (do we really want to see those two teams playing against each other again this year after the hugely absorbing but demanding RGR series?).
This is where the excitement comes in and where we could see this coming month ratchet up in a few levels of intensity - at the moment the top two rugby nations on earth are separated only by points differential.
They both have the same number of log points after banking full houses of five in all their games before now.
The All Blacks played France and Ireland at home, and they are the top two northern nations right now, so in theory they now have the easier away leg because the Boks have to face both those teams in Paris and Dublin respectively.
Both of those will be hard games. But while a big win over Wales in Cardiff is possible because big wins at that venue have become a Kiwi trend, there could be some peril in chasing a big score against Scotland at Murrayfield.
And the All Blacks lost to England at Twickenham the last time the two teams played.
The game at what is now known as the Allianz Stadium though cues the real emphasis of these November internationals.
Yes, there will be a Finals Weekend, and that could be fun, but it is hard to find anything written on the subject of the November games that does not also prominently emphasise the importance of this juncture to next year’s World Cup.
When it comes to the London game involving the All Blacks, that is when we will see whether the Kiwis have more wherewithal now to deal with a team that has a proper scrum than they had when they played the Boks in the RGR.
THE FINAL PUSH STARTS TOWARDS RWC
Not that the All Blacks will be the only team under pressure and all the teams will be balancing the here and now with the knowledge that the RWC is now less than a year away.
For northern teams that will be in camp for much of what would normally be the next off-season, this is really the start of the World Cup year, and the push towards Australia.
So it is unlikely that all the teams will just go with the same players throughout.
Bok coach Rassie Erasmus has gone Full Metal Jacket for the Italy game, prompting speculation that like in the RGR series, he will push his top players to go four games in a row without a break.
Whether he is really going to do that is something we will find out after the Italy game. Erasmus had little choice but to go with his top team against Italy as he had little time, just five days really, to prepare a different team for the Italy game in Turin.
He needed to go with the players and combinations that know each other so well and work together most seamlessly having done so under pressure in the RGR, but Rassie will know that he needs to continue growing the international experience and game capacity of players who may yet be needed at the business end in Australia if some of the more veteran current Boks go off the cliff.
Which can still happen, there are a lot of players in their mid-30s in the Bok squad.
RASSIE’S APPROACH COULD BE DETERMINED BY HOW THINGS GO
So it is going to be interesting to see what selection he comes up for when the Boks play the second game against France.
When it comes to the game after that against Ireland a lot could depend on how the southern log is shaping up - if Rassie has a chance of making the final, he is likely to go for it in Dublin. If not, he may mix up selections more.
It is all quite intriguing and it is impossible to second guess the Bok coach, but from this weekend a fine balancing act will be needed by all nations - these end-of-year games a year out from a World Cup are often exercises in discovery for coaches, and historically they’ve also occasionally been the barrier too far that have cost coaches their job.
Ask Eddie Jones what happened to his England job after the Boks outplayed his men at Twickenham in 2022.
THE GAMES TO WATCH OUT FOR THIS WEEKEND:
England v Australia - Sunday 8 November in London
Everyone wants to see if the Wallabies, as hosts of the RWC, might be able to progress to a place where they can be competitive.
They did well to beat the Boks in a one-off in September, but then lost heavily twice to New Zealand, although in both games they produced patches of good play.
Under Steve Borthwick England are struggling to establish an identity. They were doing well this time last year, and had an excellent autumn, but then came horribly unstuck in the Six Nations.
Borthwick is the international coach of a tier 1 team under most pressure.
Ireland v Argentina - Friday 6 November in Dublin
The Irish have seemingly been on the wane ever since they were thumped by France in the opening game of the last Six Nations, but then briefly threaten life, such as when they won 42-21 against England in London.
They were outplayed by the All Blacks in New Zealand last time out. Argentina on the other hand are an unknown quantity.
Their coach took the decision to rest some of his first-choice players, quite a few of them in fact, in the southern leg of the Nations Championship, with the World Cup in mind.
That might explain why Argentina’s results weren’t that great, losing as they did to an England team that had travelled around the world to be there for the final game of the leg.
Scotland v New Zealand - Saturday 7 November in Edinburgh
Scotland have pushed New Zealand several times in home games at Murrayfield in the past decade and they may do so for a while in this meeting.
But history reflects that Scotland have always come second to New Zealand, with their best result being one draw, throughout their history, and that’s a meaningful history to look at.
It is very much a case of two very similar teams playing each other, but one being the big brother and the other the little brother. The big brother always wins.
What will be interesting though is to see the All Blacks go against a team like Scotland now that they’ve started to properly embrace the all-court Dave Rennie playing style.
They were imperious against Australia, who also try to play the Kiwis at their own game, so don’t bank your house against the All Blacks getting the big win that might spike their points differential count out against the Boks on the southern log table.
THE OTHER GAMES:
Italy v South Africa (Turin, Saturday 13.40)
Wales v Japan (Cardiff, Saturday 17.40)
France v Fiji (Lyon, Saturday 21.10)
THE LOG SITUATION (after three games):
Southern Hemisphere - South Africa 15 pts, New Zealand 15, Australia 8, Argentina 7, Japan 4, Fiji 0.
Northern Hemisphere: France 12, Scotland 11, England 10, Ireland 10, Wales 5, Italy 5.