The Rugby World Cup has all become a bit of a farce. The decision to cancel the England-France and Italy-New Zealand pool games has been widely criticised, with many wondering how we got to this point.
Should Scotland-Japan also bite the bullet, a vital match in deciding who advances to the quarter finals, further questions will be raised.
While 'Super Typhoon Hagibis' is set to be a weather event of unprecedented severity, it has long been known that the unpredictable weather in Japan could have a major impact on this tournament. It is a country that is currently in the midst of typhoon season, meaning this could not have been unexpected.
Considering that World Rugby have had ten years to prepare for the event, it seems inconceivable that games would be called off a few days in advance due to the weather.
However, it now appears that there was a contingency plan in place. It was just a very bad one.
The Guardian are reporting that tournament organisers had a plan in place that should a game in Yokohama (the venue of England-France an Scotland-Japan) be called off due to weather, which was to move the game to Tokyo Stadium.
For those of you not familiar with Japanese geography, those two are 14 miles apart. 14 miles!
Now, we're no meteorologists, but places that close together would tend to experience reasonably similar weather. To have a place 14 miles away as your backup plan seems a bit ridiculous.
The Guardian also claim that a last minute plan to move the game 500 miles away to Kyushu was also considered, but deemed unrealistic. Probably should have had that one to begin with lads.
You'd have to wonder...
