For the first time in Heineken Cup history, the competition has reached the final round of pool fixtures without a single team having booked a place in the last eight.

There are eight places up for grabs, one goes to the winner of each of the six pools and the final two go to the two next best teams.

All of the details are on the BBC website, but it looks like the finalists will be:

• London Irish
• Gloucester
• Blues
• Saracens
• Wasps or Munster (biggest match of the weekend)
• Toulouse

And two others that are too close to call. Jeez I never knew it was this exciting.

I can’t believe its Thursday already and I haven’t put up anything about the other two non-upset quarterfinals.

South Africa – Fiji

What we said:

South
Africa is not Wales and Fiji have little chance of an upset... South
Africa dominate all of the important stats especially the forward-based
ones…Fiji will go out and do what they always do: play sevens.

The numbers (updated after the last table showed Fiji won!):

 *minute of possession

Apart from the lineout
and the kicking South Africa seemed to run the show. What I don’t have
here is the fact that at 60mins the scores were equal at 20. Fiji
didn’t show any respect and really did back themselves to win.

This does not bode well for South Africa. They are due to face a very confident and well rounded Argentinean team.

Argentina – Scotland

What we said:

Only
four weeks ago people would have said that this match-up between
Argentina and Scotland would be close but that the Scots would win.
It’s amazing what a victory over France and Ireland can do for a team.
Not to mention hard and fast defensive rugby, good kicking, smart
tactics and a winning attitude

It seems though, that the Argentineans are better at getting the ball back off you and I am a strong believer that turnovers win games

The Argentineans are the only team I have seen so far that has the overall pace that matches the All Blacks.

Argentina look the business and are my “Lock of the Week”

The numbers:

*minute of possession

Well a 19-13 isn’t really “Lock of
the Week material. But they did enough for victory. I think perhaps it
was actually Scotland playing better than Argentina playing worse. Then
again Argentina’s no-tries-against record is in tatters.

Scotland
has kept their 0.30 rate of handling errors going, which is not so good
to see. But they did well in the lineout snaffling 15% away from the
Argentineans. Still turnovers once again tell the story. Argentina won
the ball in the ruck and maul every three and a half minutes that
Scotland had it. Scotland only got the ball back every 10 minutes that
Argentina had it.

This is where Argentina won the game. They
only had 51% of the possession but it was their ability to get the ball
back off Scotland that enabled the victory. I don’t have the breakdown
but I imagine that a lot of Scotland’s penalties would have come from
holding on to the ball.

Scotland can be congratulated on playing better than they have so far but Argentina are fast becoming the team to beat.

It's post-mortem time with the Dropkicks, who analyse just where the All Blacks went wrong in their Rugby World Cup quarter-final against France. Also: some thoughts on the other quarterfinals, and Athletes and Dicks of the Week.

Download Episode 37 - Quarterfinals review

Subscribe to the Dropkicks Podcast (iTunes users click here).

Didn’t the refs suck?! Just kidding, this is not a sour grapes post. Especially given the amount of comments here and on other sites about how New Zealanders are bad losers. This is an actual post-match stats breakdown with the intent of giving fans some more info about the matches they have just seen. Let's call it "closure".

Australia – England

What the Dropkicks said:

Looking at the top table of results from pool matches (and with all caveats noted) this looks like another close game. Remember that Australia did not have to face a resurgent Tonga or a Samoan team seemingly out for blood.

I still back the Wallabies though. They have it over the English in the lineouts, the turnovers, the tackles and territory. The only way England can win this game (based on the crude stats above) is to play incredibly good forward rugby and let Johnny keep the scoreboard ticking over

The numbers:

*per minute of possession
**rounding

Not the first “upset” of the tournament but still a shock. The stats above show that England clearly dominated the set pieces and the tackle-ball area with roughly one turnover every 8 tackles.

Solid English forward pressure and an unwillingness by the Aussies to put their brilliant back line to the outside gave the English the victory.

We have to say though, to the Australian press, lay off the Wallabies! (and the All Blacks for that matter, we’ll handle that).

New Zealand – France

What the Dropkicks said:

“Now, if you ignore the “points for” (and the implied try-stats), not a lot separates us from the French. And lets be honest, we played some terrible teams while France had to face the best defence in Argentina.

… both teams had roughly the same amount of points against. This is perhaps more telling…

…We also gave up less penalties than the French, which means cool heads under pressure, which is what you need when it comes to the final…

Let’s just hope (or pray) that we are not the Fish n Chip-Eating Surrender Kiwis.

The numbers:

*per minute of possession

It is quite obvious from these stats that New Zealand actually won this game and that some sort of error has occurred.

The All Blacks dominated possession (71%) and territory (63%). We camped ourselves in the French 22 with some very long sets, sometimes 15 phases. And our forwards were grinding them into paste at the set pieces (Ali Williams deserved Man of the Match for his lineout work alone, but it was given to Luke McAlister).

There are some, desperately seeking a figurehead upon which to pin the blame, who will single out the referee, and some of the stats bear this out. The two penalties conceded by the French were the lowest of any team at this World Cup. Also the French spent the second largest amount of time in their own 22 of any team this weekend (only 17 seconds less than the Fijians), a large proportion of this was during the second half during which they committed no penalties.

Prior to this game the team that had conceded the least penalties was New Zealand with roughly 5 per game, while France were 8th with roughly 7 per game. You could argue that France decided to play clean for this game, but it’s more likely that some calls weren’t picked up.

There are some, desperately seeking a figurehead upon which to pin the blame, who look to our loose forwards as not doing much, but with New Zealand turning the ball over once every seven tackles (the highest of the quarterfinalists) that seems a little harsh. And France were only able to manage a turnover once every 25 tackles (the worst of the quarterfinalists), so our ball retention at the ruck and maul was good too…why did we lose again?

I believe that the reason New Zealand was beaten can’t be seen in these numbers. It was an intangible quantity. The All Blacks lacked pace in the final quarter. In the first quarter when we had momentum and looked good we got caught in a kicking match.

With France’s low turnover stats (despite their good tackle percentage) we should have been running it early and often. And while we did one in three of France’s lineouts we just weren’t finding touch. The midfield combination didn’t look connected when running close but out wide we were doing well.

France finished the game with all the momentum and in the end that is what gave them the game.

*minute of possession

The be-padded South African centre Jaque Fourie has said that the South Africans do not respect the Fijians. And while this seems a rather arrogant thing to say, you can’t argue with him. Firstly, he’s pretty tough and might thump you, and secondly he’s right, the respect needs to go from the Fijians to the South Africans.

South Africa is not Wales and Fiji has little chance of an upset. The table above really shows that. South Africa dominate all of the important stats, especially the forward-based ones (lineouts etc). Fourie is right again, Fiji needs to show respect, not South Africa.

The thing is that Fiji won’t bother respecting South Africa. Fiji will go out and do what they always do: play sevens.

I think that Fiji can win this if they keep the ball in hand and try tricky little chip kicks, behind the back passes etc etc. Because here’s the thing that Fourie forgets, the underdog will never beat his opponent if he respects them.

Quarterfinal action looms at the 2007 Rugby World Cup, and the Dropkicks make their picks as to who's going to be facing off come Semi-final time. Also: Air NZ Cup results, Athlete and Dick of the Week, and the rundown on the big Dropkicks competition.

Download Episode 36 - Rugby World Cup Week #4 pt.2

Subscribe to the Dropkicks Podcast (iTunes users click here).

All you iTunes subscribers will have this one already, but, for those who don't subscribe to it that way (we recommend you do, as we, and by we I mean I, sometimes forget to post the 'cast to the website in good time), here it is.

The Dropkicks look back at the final round of pool play at the 2007 Rugby World Cup.

Download Episode 35 - Rugby World Cup Week #4 pt.1

Subscribe to the Dropkicks Podcast (iTunes users click here).

*minute of possession

One of the above teams has been to the World Cup semifinals the other has not. Only four weeks ago people would have said that this match-up between Argentina and Scotland would be close but that the Scots would win. It’s amazing what a victory over France and Ireland can do for a team. Not to mention hard and fast defensive rugby, good kicking, smart tactics and a winning attitude (I’ve never seen a rugby team bring on so many of their children after a game).

Still looking at the stats above (with all caveats noted) it’s hard to tell the difference in a few important areas. Points per m.o.p. is basically the same, so are handling errors, successful tackles and own lineouts won. It seems though, that the Argentineans are better at getting the ball back off you and I am a strong believer that turnovers win games.

Because of this the Scots have to be worried about their handling error rate. 0.3 is the second highest rate of the tournament and equate to roughly one error every three minutes and 20 seconds. Admittedly Argentina’s one error every four minutes is also pretty bad.

But it’s the intangibles that make Argentina the team most people pick to go on to the semifinals. It’s at this point that I would love to see Tracey Nelson’s famous First Three to the Breakdown stats. The Argentineans are the only team I have seen so far that has the overall pace that matches the All Blacks. Their numbers seem to get back so quickly that there often seems to be three or four players at fullback.

Argentina look the business and are my “Lock of the Week” (and that's a pretty big lock)

*minute of possession

Australia has played England at four of the five world cups and two of those games were the finals in 1991 and 2003 (1999 was the only time they never met). So historically how do they stack up? Well its two games apiece and one world cup final each. Australia just snuffles ahead on points aggregate, 70-57.

Looking at the top table of statistics from the pool matches (and with all caveats noted) this looks like another close game. Remember that Australia did not have to face a resurgent Tonga or a Samoan team seemingly out for blood.

I still back the Wallabies though. They have it over the English in the lineouts, the turnovers, the tackles and territory. The only way England can win this game (based on the crude stats above) is to play incredibly good forward rugby and let Johnny keep the scoreboard ticking over.