To say the Langford-based Canadian men’s rugby team needs a win, if only for morale’s sake, is like saying the Sahara needs water. It’s looking awfully parched these days on the national rugby landscape.
No. 21 Canada wants to use the Americas Rugby Championship Test match Saturday at 6:30 p.m. at Westhills Stadium against No. 25 Brazil as a first step in the process of restoring some much-needed lustre in the sport following a disheartening string of Test losses.
“We just need to get in the win column and to take advantage of home field Saturday to get it done,” said veteran Canadian scrum-half Phil Mack of Victoria.
Canada, which has never failed to qualify for the World Cup, is down to one last chance to make it to the 2019 World Cup in Japan through the four-team, at-large world repechage tournament in November for the 20th and final World Cup berth.
Losses to the U.S. Eagles last summer in the direct North American qualifier, the first time that has happened, and then to Uruguay in a bit of a shocker in the second-chance Americas qualifier, has left Canada in a precarious position.
“The rest of the world is developing in rugby and we have to do the same,” Mack said.
Nowhere is that more evident in the number of 30-and-over players Canadian coach Kingsley Jones has been forced to field.
“We’ve got to build our depth so guys like me are being challenged and are fighting to get on the pitch,” said the 31-year-old Mack, a graduate of the James Bay, University of Victoria Vikes and Oak Bay High programs.
“We need that across the board.”
That age gap in the program needs to be bridged.
“Going from U-20 to the national team was the only goal I had when I was a younger player,” Mack said.
Even the veterans have found the ball slippery and hard to hold on to in recent Tests.
“We’ve played some good rugby and then have shot ourselves in the foot,” Mack said.
“We are beating ourselves with individual errors. We get downfield and then we give it away and let teams off the hook with cheap penalties and mistakes. We have to eliminate silly mistakes.
“I don’t mind losing if we play well because then you’ve given it your best. But losing while making silly mistakes gets frustrating. We need a good performance and result Saturday and to correct those mistakes.”
If it isn’t addressed now, it won’t be by November when everything is on the line in the last-chance World Cup qualifier.
Canada is 0-2 in the Americas Championship after a 29-10 loss to the U.S. Eagles last Saturday in Sacramento. The first-round game was a 32-31 loss the weekend before in Montevideo, Uruguay, a Test that also stood as a qualifier for the 2019 World Cup as Uruguay booked its ticket to Japan.
Canada closes out the Americas Championship on Feb. 24 against host Argentina XV in Jujuy and March 3 against host and No. 26 Chile in Santiago.
“We can’t keep relying on our 30-year-old-plus players and we need more depth,” said Canadian coach Jones, hitting on a familiar refrain.
“These Americas Championship games are a way to help build that depth,” said Jones, who introduced several young faces into the lineup last week against the U.S. in Sacramento, including Test debutante Luke Campbell of Victoria, who started at No. 8.
“These players need to get used to the intensity of Test rugby. Where they are used to going 30 miles per hour, they need to go 60.”
Canadian rugby has advocates across the Pacific who hope the national side does it.
If Canada qualifies for 2019 World Cup Japan, by winning the last-chance repechage, it would play a group game in Iwate prefecture. The capital of Iwate is Morioka, which has strong Canadian ties, because it is a sister city to Victoria.
“Because of our sister city, we would love for Canada to play here in the World Cup,” said Keisuke Shirane, president of the Iwate Rugby Football Union and head of the prefecture's organizing committee for its World Cup games.
Whether Canada can rally to get there, of course, is up to the players. A step in preparing for that takes places Saturday at Westhills Stadium against a Brazilian team that was eliminated in South American World Cup qualifying.
“It’s a must-win for us,” Mack said.
It’s not a qualifier, so that’s not literally so. But it is on so many other levels.
