Rugby World Cup 2023 will be hosted by France; teams put into bands for the draw, with rankings on January 1 determining places; England and Wales in Band 1 alongside New Zealand and defending champions South Africa; draw takes place in Paris at 11:30am GMT on Monday
Monday 14 December 2020 11:06, UK
The draw for the 2023 Rugby World Cup takes place on Monday, a little over 13 months after the Springboks lifted the trophy in Tokyo.
Could England go one better this time around and lift the Webb Ellis Trophy? Can Scotland atone for their poor tournament in 2019 which saw them crash out before the knockouts? Will Ireland shake their reputation as perennial World Cup underachievers?
A lot will be determined by each team's opponents in the pool stages, and all will be revealed when the draw takes place in Paris at 12.30pm local time (11.30am in UK and Ireland) on Monday.
Twenty teams will contest the tournament in France in three years' time; 12 have already qualified by virtue of finishing in the top three of their respective pools in the 2019 edition, and they have been put into the top three bands for the draw.
Due to the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the international calendar, the World Rugby rankings as of January 1 this year determined which band each of those countries was placed in.
England and Wales are in Band 1 alongside defending champions South Africa and New Zealand, while Band 2 contains Ireland, Australia, 2023 host nation France and last year's hosts Japan.
Scotland, Argentina, Italy and Fiji are in Band 3, with the remaining eight teams coming through the regional qualification process and to be allocated into Band 4 and Band 5 based on relative strength.
France will be the first team drawn as they are the host nation, after which all slots from Band 5 will be drawn into the four pools, then Band 4 and so on, with the top seeds in Band 1 the last to be drawn.
The full tournament fixture list, with date, location and times of all games, will be announced towards the end of February next year.
France last hosted the World Cup in 2007, where they were beaten by England in the semi-finals in Paris. Les Bleus have one of the better records when it comes to making it into semi-finals and finals, but are yet to win a World Cup.
Meanwhile, it was announced earlier this week that England will play world champions South Africa and Australia at Twickenham in November 2021.
Eddie Jones' side will play three Test matches next autumn, beginning their campaign against a yet-to-be-decided 'emerging nation' on November 6.
They face Australia the following weekend in a repeat of the 2019 Rugby World Cup quarter-finals, which England won 40-16.
It will be the eighth time England have faced the Wallabies under head coach Jones, who has won all seven Tests against his native country.
England sign off for 2021 against South Africa on November 20 in what will be the first meeting between the teams since last year's Rugby World Cup final, which the Springboks won 32-12.
England, who were unable to play southern hemisphere opposition this year due to the coronavirus pandemic, won the inaugural Autumn Nations Cup with a sudden-death extra-time victory against France last Sunday.
"These will be some good games of rugby and tough tests for us as we work to improve ourselves as a team," said Jones.
"South Africa are world champions and we'll be looking to benchmark ourselves against them.
"Australia are rapidly improving, have a lot of new talent coming through and good coaches like Dave Rennie and Scott Wisemantel, who we know well.
"We've not had the chance to play southern hemisphere teams this year so it will be a good chance to see where we are up to and hopefully some great rugby for our supporters to enjoy."
