Wales are the only climbers on the back of the penultimate round of the Six Nations, swapping places with France to occupy fifth place in the latest IRB World Rankings.
The defending Six Nations champions now sit just under five tenths ahead of France, who rescued a draw in Dublin to ensure they will not suffer a whitewash in the 2013 Championship.
Ireland remain seventh despite the draw, having avoided sliding to their lowest ever position by avoiding defeat on home soil. Scotland remain tenth with the loss to Wales but have seen their advantage over Tonga below halved.
England remain the leading northern hemisphere nation in the rankings after surviving a second-half onslaught by Italy at Twickenham on Sunday, but the result had no outcome on either side's rating points. This means that England's cushion over fifth place has shrunk slightly to 3.52 points.
There was more movement in the rankings as a result of the four European Nations Cup 2014 encounters on Saturday, although Russia were the only one of the eight sides in action to end the weekend in a higher position than they began it.
Vasily Artemyev's try five minutes from time gave Russia some breathing space as they battled to a 31-23 victory over Portugal in Coimbra, a win which lifted them one place to 19th and above a Spain side crushed 61-18 by defending champions Georgia in Tbilisi.
Georgia remain 17th - and the highest ranked side in the European Nations Cup - but have slightly narrowed the deficit to USA above and their advantage over Romania below them after topping 60 points for the second time in a row against Spain on home soil.
The Lelos remain atop the Division 1A standings on point differential from Romania, who are also unbeaten in 2013 after battling past Belgium 32-14 in Brussels. The defeat on home soil sees Belgium fall one place to 24th.
Georgia and Romania will meet in Bucharest on Saturday to decide who will top Division 1A at the halfway stage of a competition that will provide the Europe 1 and Europe 2 qualifiers for Rugby World Cup 2015 in England.
Portugal, like Belgium, suffered a fall in the rankings after losing this weekend, dropping two places to 23rd with Uruguay and Namibia the beneficiaries with one and two place climbs respectively.
The biggest fallers of the week, though, were the Czech Republic, who slipped three places to 50th on the back of a 27-8 loss to Germany in Division 1B of the European Nations Cup. Germany remain 29th, albeit now only a quarter of a rating point behind Hong Kong above them.
IRB World rankings:
1 New Zealand
2 South Africa
3 Australia
4 England
5 Wales
6 France
7 Ireland
8 Samoa
9 Argentina
10 Scotland
11 Tonga
12 Italy
13 Fiji
14 Canada
15 Japan
16 USA
17 Georgia
18 Romania
19 Russia
20 Spain
21 Uruguay
22 Namibia
23 Portugal
24 Belgium
25 Chile
26 Poland
27 Korea
28 Hong Kong
29 Germany
30 Ukraine
With thanks to the IRB
Comments
ABlack says...
And as usual NZ sits at the top, which they have done for over 80% of the time since IRB created rankings in 2003, a phenomenal achievement...
Posted 20:21 17th March 2013
rugby_rockstar says...
I still think that Ireland are better than Wales. Ireland have been hit by injuries and played two of their matches in freezing deluges. While it has to be said that neither italy or scotland were anywhere near there best in their losses to Wales. You compare italy's perfromances vs England and France to their performance against wales and there's no argument that Italy were below par against the Welsh. You can only play whats in front of you, but give Ireland their players and a dry pitch and they'll beat Wales.
Posted 12:04 13th March 2013
Chinstan says...
Fattysock believe that as with the BaBa's games they are not capped internationals and so don't count to rankings. Agree that the seeding for the RWC is a complete joke. Believe that teams 1-7 are now the correct teams order may change a bit but at least you wouldn't get the farse of having (currently) 3rd,4th & 5th in the same group, ridiculous
Posted 17:41 12th March 2013
fattysock says...
1) Wales back up to 5th, when only a couple of months ago they were in 9th... but the IRB still think that it's wise to have the World Cup based on rankings that far out.
2) Does anyone know the rankings ramifications of the Lions tour? I can't really think of a fair way to do it... so presumably they are excluded entirely?
Posted 16:03 12th March 2013