Starting its ninth Rugby World Cup, Romania probably did not have high hopes of qualifying for the quarter-finals. First, because the Chênes have never got past the pitfalls of the group stages until now. Then, because they had the misfortune of falling into the toughest group, B. “We want to learn and progress as players. This is what makes me say that we are going to be up to the task,” said one of the vice-captains of the selection, Ovidiu Cojocaru, before the competition.

It is clear that the journey of the hooker and his teammates for the moment resembles a long way of the cross, punctuated by heavy defeats: 82 to 8 against Ireland, 76 to 0 against South Africa, 84 0 against Scotland. To the point of asking: is it better to participate in the tournament even with a series of disappointments or not to be qualified?

The 19th nation in the World Rugby rankings – the international federation – plays against Tonga, Sunday October 8 in Villeneuve-d’Ascq in the North (at 5:45 p.m.), its last meeting in this 2023 World Cup. A match that it would have should not argue. For good reason: it was Spain which had won its place in this group B. But if the XV del Leon validated its ticket for France at the end of the 2021-2022 European international championship – a sort of tournament of the six nations B –, he failed to compost it. In part, because of Romania’s surveillance.

In March 2022, World Rugby opened an investigation after a complaint from the Romanian Federation, arguing that Iberian prop Gavin van den Berg had participated in qualifying matches when he was not allowed to do so. After a few weeks of investigation, the international body considered that the copy of the passport that the player of South African origin presented had been falsified and that he had not spent enough continuous time in the country to qualify for selection. Spain was disqualified.

A photo as proof

According to L’Equipe, this error was spotted by Romanian “investigators”, therefore, “paid to dig into the past of each new selection from their opponents”. The work of said detectives allowed them to provide a photo of Gavin van den Berg at a wedding in South Africa in 2019, when the pillar should still have been in Spain, according to the dates on the passport copy presented.

History is all the more cruel because it repeats itself. In 2019, XV del Leon had already missed the World Cup in Japan as two players were declared ineligible after qualifying matches. This time, the “investigators” were Russian and had also found disputes in the Belgian and… Romanian selections!

“It’s not a gift that we receive, it’s a place that the team earned through hard work,” Alin Petrache, the president of the Romanian Rugby Federation, preferred to qualify in July 2022 on the Antena 1 television channel. The efforts have been enormous and we must thank the players, coaches and all the clubs. »

He also recalled, on this occasion, that the Oaks could have obtained their place in the World Cup – even without the ousting of Spain – during a final qualifying tournament in November. If they had gone through this stage and emerged from it, the Romanians would have been placed in group C, in theory much more affordable than B.