The Springboks have been given a couple of days off following their 66-7 win against Canada in Kobe. The weather in the coastal city has been clear, warm and pleasant.<\/p>\n
The team will only head back to Tokyo on 14 October. They won\u2019t be in any rush to encounter what experts are calling a typhoon of \u2018explosive intensification\u2019.<\/p>
Hagibis is leading today\u2019s edition of the\u00a0Japan Times<\/em>. The story explains what the main island of Honshu will be up against in the coming days \u2013 the US military\u2019s forecasting agency has put the typhoon on a par with a category 5 hurricane \u2013 and the more you read the more you realise why a couple of big fixtures in Toyota and Yokohama have already been cancelled.<\/p>\n Train operations will be suspended if Hagibis doesn\u2019t alter its present course. Experts say it has escalated from a tropical storm to a violent typhoon in a short space of time. The term \u2018perfect storm\u2019 seems apt rather than overly dramatic.<\/p> \u2018This only happens when you have all the right ingredients,\u2019 Robert Sperta, a meteorologist and expert on typhoons told the Japan Times.<\/p>\n \u2018Like if you had a fire and instead of throwing gasoline on it to make it bigger you also grabbed some lighter fluid, a bit of oil and a couple of aerosol cans for good measure.\u2019<\/p>\n Another expert interviewed by the paper said that the high wind speeds could knock down utility poles and \u2018blow away trucks\u2019. These statements put the matter of the recently cancelled rugby matches into perspective.<\/p>\n World Rugby confirmed on Thursday that the Italy-New Zealand clash in Toyota as well as the England-France game in Yokohama will not go ahead. The final call on whether to stage the Japan-Scotland match will be made on Sunday.<\/p>\n Many have asked why World Rugby didn\u2019t have a contingency plan in place for this worst-case scenario. After all, there\u2019s been talk of a typhoon reducing a crunch match to a 0-0 draw since the lead-up to the start of the tournament.<\/p>\n The safety of fans and players must come first. However, one has to ask how you can stage a tournament during a country\u2019s typhoon season without have the necessary plans and contingencies in place to ensure that matches aren\u2019t reduced to 0-0 draws. One log point, of course, may determine whether a side advances to the playoffs or not.<\/p>\n I don\u2019t think that Italy would have beaten the All Blacks. England would probably have edged France to secure top spot in Pool C.<\/p>\n That said, a few weeks ago, I would not have bet on Uruguay to beat Fiji or on Japan to humble Ireland. We all know how those matches turned out. In rugby, there\u2019s always a chance of an upset.<\/p>\n Japan, the success story that\u2019s captured the hearts of local and foreign fans alike, are the favourites to beat Scotland. If the match doesn\u2019t go ahead due to the typhoon, however, Scotland will have every right to feel hard done by.<\/p>\n Personally, I feel that the fans are the biggest losers in this situation.<\/p>\n It\u2019s been a fantastic World Cup to date. The Japanese have brought their own unique energy to the tournament and every foreign fan I\u2019ve chatted to has declared Asia\u2019s first World Cup a resounding success.<\/p>\n It\u2019s a shame that the pool stage won\u2019t have an explosive ending on account of the weather. While Hagibis should be taken seriously and no one should be placed in harm\u2019s way, it\u2019s sad to think that the most exciting and unpredictable part of this World Cup is on course for an anticlimax.<\/p>\n