The new season of the Rugby Championship begins on the weekend and the opening match is a heavyweight showdown between great rivals Australia and New Zealand. This is the former Tri-Nations which has evolved up to the Rugby Championship with the addition of Argentina in 2012. So far the Rugby Championship has been all about New Zealand who are the 1/7 odds-on favourites* (Betting Odds were taken on August 14th, 2018 at 7:08 p.m.) to claim the title once again.
2018 Rugby Championship Winner Odds
New Zealand 1/7
Australia 7/1
South Africa 7/1
Argentina 80/1
* (Betting Odds were taken from Paddy Power on August 14th, 2018 at 7:08 p.m.)
2018 Fixtures
The tournament spans eight weeks of action, in which each team will be playing six matches. It all beings on August 18th with Australia playing host to New Zealand and it all wraps up on October 6th when you have the South Africa v New Zealand and Argentina v Australia fixtures to round things off with.
Round 1 – August 18th
Australia v New Zealand
South Africa v Argentina
Round 2 – August 25th
New Zealand v Australia
Argentina v South Africa
Round 3 – September 8th
New Zealand v Argentina
Australia v South Africa
Round 4 – September 15th
New Zealand v South Africa
Australia v Argentina
Round 5 – September 29th
South Africa v Australia
Argentina v New Zealand
Round 6 – October 6th
South Africa v New Zealand
Argentina v Australia
Title Holders
New Zealand have won five of the six previous editions of the Rugby Championship, their only slip happening in 2015 when they were beaten to the punch by Australia, in what was a shortened form (teams played each other just one) because of allowing more preparation time ahead of the 2015 Rugby World Cup. New Zealand won the 2017 Rugby Championship with six wins from six games played.
New Zealand
Overall New Zealand’s record in the Rugby Championship is P33 W30 D1 L2 which is pretty remarkable. It just goes to show that they are pretty much existing on a whole different level to the rest of the world when it comes to the sport and you can take a 5/6 odds price at Paddy Power on them winning all six games in this season’s Rugby Championship* (Betting Odds were taken on August 17th, 2018 at 7:08 p.m.)
The All Blacks are strong favourites to win their opening game against Australia, even with them being away from home. They are 2/9 odds on at Paddy Power to collect the victory* (Betting Odds were taken on August 17th, 2018 at 7:08 p.m.). The All Blacks have won seven of their last eight games against the Wallabies. Their most recent meeting was in Brisbane in October last year and the Australians won that 23-18 in a shock.
Australia
The Wallabies go as second favourites and given the summer that they had against Ireland, it is going to take a bold punter to back them to get the better of the All Blacks. Australia lost their home series 2-1 against Ireland in June and that was after opening with a win in the first match. Those series of defeats though leaves them with just a W1 L4 record in their last five games played so they are not on top of their game by any strength of the imagination.
There is a twofold problem with them really. The first is that there are holes in their defence which they can’t seem to plug and haven’t been able to do so for a few years now. The other is that they are lacking creative quality across the board and really take out Israel Folau and Kurtley Beale you are struggling for inspiration. They have a fairly young pack as well but watch out for Tuopu. They did score well against Ireland in the summer and will be battle hardened. They may not be able to close the gap on the All Blacks though.
South Africa
We like the look of South Africa coming through and taking second place at 9/5 odds with Paddy Power* (Betting Odds were taken on August 17th, 2018 at 7:08 p.m.) ahead of the Wallabies. They have been in a bit of a rut for a while but they have shown this year alone with wins over England, that there could be brighter times ahead. That was a good series win that they recorded against England in a really testing series.
Coach Rassie Erasmus is still settling into the role. The Series win over England will certainly have given them plenty of confidence and scrum-half Faf De Klerk was highly impressive in the series. They are certainly looking a stronger option that twelve months ago. They didn’t get a win against either New Zealand or Australia last year in the tournament but could be more competitive and on level terms with the Wallabies.
Argentina
Another wooden spoon is likely to be coming to the Pumas as they look out of their depth in the Rugby Championship. They have played six matches during 2018 with a W3 D3 record. We are starting to see a move towards them selecting more of their overseas players which will strengthen them and they have a new coach in Mario Ledesma. He took over after the June Tests so it is unlikely that he has enough time to radically shake things up and change their fortunes. They were really poor in the forwards in the summer, lacking any kind of bite and their usual physical presence.
Predictions
In such a small tournament dominated by one team, it is hard to find value in tournament betting. We don’t see anyone touching New Zealand again, but we are going to roll with them taking wins in all of their matches again as a betting option. The other option we see as offering some value is in backing the Springboks to get the better of the Wallabies in the race for second place.
