Scotland have drawn Ireland and hosts Japan in their Group for the Rugby World Cup Finals in the ceremony at Kyoto which marks the start of the countdown to the 2019 tournament.
The Scots, banded in the second rank of four nations by virtue of their ranking of fifth in the world, will face their Celtic and Six Nations rivals who are currently ranked fourth and were top seeded. Scotland beat the Irish 27-22 in their most recent meeting at BT Murrayfield in February.
The Scots also face host nation Japan, whom they have met in the pool stages for the 2015, 2003 and 1991 tournaments. The Scots have won all seven test matches against the Brave Blossoms, beating them in Aichi and Tokyo in two tests on tour only last summer.
The remaining teams in Scotland’s pool have still to be confirmed by the qualification process but one is likely to be Romania, the second-tier European champions this season, and currently co-coached by Scot Rob Moffat.
The other is a qualifier from a playoff featuring the third-placed team in the ongoing Oceania qualifying process and the second European qualifying team.
This could mean Samoa, Fiji or Tonga with games in the Oceania qualifying only half completed and currently going with home advantage. That qualification process will be completed in July, and whoever finishes third would be favourites to beat the second-ranked European team, probably Spain or Russia.
Scotland at least avoided the customary “Group of Death” which seems to be Group 3 where England face France and Argentina. The Pumas slipped in world rankings to fall into the third band of automatic qualifiers and were the team everyone wanted to avoid.
Champions New Zealand and South Africa have been drawn together in Pool 2 with those teams likely to be the quarter-final opponents from Scotland’s group.
Earlier, World Rugby confirmed that the three-year residency qualification for international rugby has been lengthened to five years, by a unanimous decision of the governing body’s council.
That meant both Scotland and Ireland, thought to be opposed to the change, fell into line with the apparent concession that the new eligibility rule will not come into force until the last day of 2020.
