A XV from 15?

With the world cup now in full swing, it is always tempting to try to come up with the best XV in world rugby.  However, I find the challenge of assembly a world team where each country can only contribute one player more interesting - do you start with the key positions and then work out?  Do you start with the best teams, or do you start with the worst?  Or do you look for stand out players in any teams and then try to work out a XV?

I don't think there are any places you can hide in world rugby now - poor props and you will get penalised constantly in the scrums and when you're giving away that many penalties it gets hard to get any continuity.  Poor 2nd rows and you struggle in line outs as well as getting pushed back in scrums.  Poor back row and you never get any quick ball, so you're backs struggle to get space to work in.  Poor scrum and fly halves, the outside backs again don't have anything to work with.  Poor centres, you never get over the gain line from first phase ball.  Poor back 3, and you get peppered by high balls and struggle to get any territory.  Consequently, my approach will see me taking the best players from the worse teams first, and then taking good players from the best teams to fit in instead of their best.

The current IRB rankings are:

1(1)	NEW ZEALAND	90.55
2(3)	SOUTH AFRICA	86.71
3(2)	AUSTRALIA	84.84
4(4)	ENGLAND	83.99
5(5)	FRANCE	83.78
6(8)	IRELAND	82.50
7(6)	WALES	80.73
8(7)	SCOTLAND	79.12
9(9)	ARGENTINA	77.30
10(11)	ITALY	73.88
11(14)	CANADA	73.74
12(10)	SAMOA	73.59
13(13)	JAPAN	71.95
14(15)	FIJI	71.01
15(12)	TONGA	70.30
16(16)	GEORGIA	70.00
17(18)	USA	66.38
18(17)	ROMANIA	65.69
19(20)	NAMIBIA	61.24
20(21)	PORTUGAL	60.67

(http://www.irb.com/rankings/full.html)

The first 10 teams are obvious, Tri Nations, 6 Nations and Argentina.  After these, it becomes more awkward.  I will go for the Samoa, Tonga, USA, Georgia and Namibia.  Apologies to the higher ranked teams, especially Canada and Japan, but I think they have players that stand out more in their teams, and are closer to the level of the top 10 nations, (most unlucky here is the Japanese 10 James Arlidge who played exceptionally well against France).

Starting with Georgia, I would take their openside flanker Mamuka Gorgodze, man of the match against England, and voted the best overseas player in France's Top 14 league - beating players such as Contepomi Parisse and Wilkinson.  Namibia would give me their captain and flanker Jacques Burger, who has recently left the Sharks for Saracens and is a bit of a one man wrecking ball.  From Tonga I would have the Saints prop Soane Tonga'uiha, arguably the best prop in the Premiership.With Samoa, the choice is between Henry and Alessand Tuilagi, and Seilia Mapusua, and I think I will have Mapusua at 13 - Exiles fans will tell you how much they missed him since he went to Japan, allowing me to take Takudzwa Ngwenya from the USA to play on the wing - the man who famously outpaced Habana at the last world cup.

Moving into the top 10 Nations, we look at Italy, France, Ireland, Scotland, England, Wales and Argentina.  From Italy the two obvious candidates are Castro and Parisse.  For France and Wales it is the outside backs, Jamie Roberts and the front rows.  Ireland have BOD, POC and Bowe.  Scotland and England have second rows in Courtney Lawes and Richie Gray, and Scrum Halves.  Argentina, the strength is in the pack and in Hernandez who they are sorely missing this World Cup, and one of the stars of the last one.  From this, I would take Parrise, Bowe, Gray, Youngs, Hernandez, Adam Jones, and Servat, although it is very tempting to switch to Lawes/Cusiter - or potentially both second rows leaving room to take du Preez from SA.  This leaves me a second row, full back and inside centre from the Tri-Nations.  I would have Victor Matfield, Sonny Bill Williams and Kurtley Beale.

The Full Team:
1: Tonga'uiha (Tonga)
2: Servat (France)
3: Jones (Wales)
4: Gray (Scotland)
5: Matfield (SA)
6: Burger (Namibia)
7: Gorgodze (Georgia)
8: Parisse (Italy)
9: Youngs (England)
10: Hernandez (Argentina)
11: Ngwenya (USA)
12: Williams (NZ)
13: Mapusua (Samoa)
14: Bowe (Ireland)
15: Beale (Australia)

Looking at the players, only a handful would get close to a normal world XV, possibly only 1, 3, 5, 8, 9, 12, 14, and 15 would be considered with no guarantees about being picked.  However given the exercise here, I think this is potentially one of the better teams possible.