Ireland vs All Blacks

The connoisseur's choice of internationals this weekend is New Zealand v Ireland and the chance of history being made.

This weekend, though, what feels a more traditional format begins, with teams travelling to the other side of the world for a Test series of meaningful length against one team. South Africa have picked a characteristically monstrous team, packed with World Cup winners, for their first Test against Wales, while Argentina have gone similarly full-bore for theirs against Scotland. Wales give a first cap to Leicester flanker Tommy Reffell, who will line up against Leicester teammate and fellow English champion, Jasper Wiese, at No8 for the Springboks. Alun Wyn Jones’s 150 caps will weigh heavily on Wales’s bench. Cian Healy was carted off with a twisted knee in Ireland’s 32-17 defeat to the Maori on Tuesday, but he seems to have recovered sufficiently to assume his place on the bench this weekend. If international rugby gets its way, every other year we will see yet another tournament of meaning and intensity crank itself up on this first weekend of July, in a desperate bid to hold off the encroaching power and influence of the domestic game. France have only two Tests this July, in Japan. Whoever wins in Eden Park will leapfrog them into second place in World Rugby’s rankings. In the perennial struggle between domestic sport and international, more exquisitely poised in rugby than anywhere else, this weekend marks the opening of the latest window for the international game to set out its stall.

All Blacks v Ireland, the opening test in a three-match tour. Kicking off at 7.05pm, at Eden Park. What's at stake? The All Blacks are likely to meet either ...

The PR team also ask — quite reasonably — that anyone attending the game be nice to the staff. Two former world players of the year, Beauden Barrett and Johnny Sexton, are running the show. And Covid-19 went through their coaching staff quicker than a group of QAnon nutters in the crowd at a Donald Trump rally. Nope. Ireland are a real-deal team — and tonight's first test is their best chance to break down another barrier, beating the All Blacks at home. There are 120 trains and buses running to the venue for free. Englishman Karl Dickson is the referee. They've won three of the past five matches between these two sides, never having claimed an All Black scalp prior to 2016. If the All Blacks win all three matches, the series is no big deal. The good folk in the Eden Park PR team tell us they're expecting to sell 6500 punnets of hot chips and 2000 boxes of donuts. Lose one, and we'll shift nervously in our seats. So, there will be many tea leaves to sift after this series. They will be greatly added by the fact the All Blacks are often scratchy in their first test of the year.