The 2008 end of year rugby tests, also known as the Autumn internationals saw

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South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...

Argentina Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...

, the

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and

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tour the northern hemisphere. The tour ended with the traditional 'final challenge'

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match, against Australia, which was the first rugby union

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at the new

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. New Zealand and Australia also contested a

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match outside of either country for the first time; the match was played in

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China ( abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delt ...

with the hope of raising rugby's profile in

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. The test matches took on added significance, with seedings for the

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draw to take place on 1 December at stake. For the first time in the history of the

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, the

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used the

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to seed teams in the World Cup draw. Teams will be assigned to four-strong seeding pots based on their rankings; each team within a pot will be drawn into a different pool for the World Cup finals. New Zealand recorded a second straight grand slam tour.

Overview

Week 1

----

Week 2

---- ---- ---- ---- ---- * Kaplan, who went into the match sharing the record for most Tests as referee (46) with Paul Honiss of

, took sole possession of the record. He replaced the injured Steve Walsh as referee for this match. ----

Week 3

---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ----

Week 4

Going into Week 4, the main storyline was the battle for fourth place in the IRB World Rankings. New Zealand, South Africa, and Australia were entrenched in the top three. The team that stood in fourth place on 1 December would avoid being drawn into the same pool as one of the Tri Nations powers in 2011. Four teams could have ended the week in fourth place: Argentina, England, France, and Wales. ---- * The Pacific Islanders defeated a Test team for the first time in nine attempts. ---- ---- The missed conversion by

Ronan O'Gara Ronan John Ross O'Gara ( ga, Rónán Ó Gadhra; born 7 March 1977) is an Irish former rugby union player and current coach. O'Gara played as a fly-half and is Ireland's second most-capped player and highest ever points scorer. He is currently ...

on Ireland's only try of the match proved decisive for Argentina. With the other results on the day, the Pumas would have dropped to fifth place, behind England, if O'Gara had converted, as it would have given Ireland a win by more than 15 points. As it turned out, Argentina retained fourth by a narrow margin. ---- ---- ----

Week 5

The battle for fourth place in the

finished this weekend, with

remaining in fourth place without playing as

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lost and

Wales Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the Wales–England border, east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the ...

failed to achieve the 15-point winning margin required. Argentina therefore took top seeding for the following month's

draw along with the three Tri-Nations teams. The other major news of the week was New Zealand's win over England, completing a successful Grand Slam tour for the All Blacks. This was the All Blacks' third such successful tour, with the previous ones being in 1978 and 2005. ---- ----

Effect on World Cup seeding

Following the 29 November tests, the 12 teams that qualified automatically for the

were seeded thus: Pot 1 * * * * Pot 2 * * * * Pot 3 * * * *

Notes and references

{{DEFAULTSORT:End-of-year

2008 File:2008 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Lehman Brothers went bankrupt following the Subprime mortgage crisis; Cyclone Nargis killed more than 138,000 in Myanmar; A scene from the opening ceremony of the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing; ...

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