The tournament hosts have been placed in a tough pool alongside Wales and Australia, plus Fiji and Uruguay, but Tindall has predicted England will ride a wave of home support to reach the final at Twickenham, where he believes they will face defending champions New Zealand on October 31.
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Brett Gosper, the chief executive of World Rugby, confirmed that discussions on the subject have already taken place.
“An England win would be fantastic, not only for the event itself from our perspective, but also going forward”, RFU chief executive Ian Ritchie said in an interview.
However, asked if teams would be disqualified for breaking rules regarding concussion, an increasingly hot topic in rugby union after a series of high-profile cases, Gosper said: “No, no. It is unlikely that would happen”.
Hawk-Eye technology will be used during the Rugby World Cup to help officials keep on top of disciplinary issues.
“We don’t envisage misuse of the protocols that we have, but we think it’s important to state that non-compliance will be sanctioned, because this is a very important area for us”. And England full-back Mike Brown had serious problems after being knocked out in the 47-17 RBS 6 Nations victory over Italy at Twickenham on February 14.
“Following successful tests, the system has clear benefits for the match official team, the medical team and fans around the world”.
It’s cold comfort for Australian fans but Rugby World Cup bosses will seek to avoid another pool of death like the Wallabies’ group-stage dogfight with England, Wales and Fiji in future.
“Heathrow is globally-renowned and its appointment underscores the enormous appeal of Rugby World Cup“.
The announcement of Heathrow as an official tournament provider follows the appointments of Heineken, Land Rover, Societe Generale, DHL, Emirates and MasterCard as Rugby World Cup 2015 worldwide partners, as well as Coca-Cola, Canon and Toshiba, who are official sponsors.
The draw for this year’s World Cup was made nearly three years ago on teams’ world rankings.
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“These games are massive because it is a great stepping stone to building momentum into that first World Cup match”, said Joseph, a Samsung brand ambassador.
