World Rugby Women's Rankings preview

World Rugby has published the ranking permutations for the two WXV 2024 warm-up matches in Europe this weekend. 

Permutation highlights:

• England cannot improve their rating with victory over France due to the 9.63 points difference between the teams before home weighting is factored in.
• The Red Roses will remain on top of the rankings even if they suffer a heavy defeat, although their advantage could be slashed from 7.58 rating points to 3.63 points.
• This would require France to win by more than 15 points, a scenario that would lift Les Bleues above Canada and New Zealand into second – a position they occupied for a solitary week in July 2016.
• A smaller margin of victory would still be enough to lift France above Canada into third.
• Wales will become the higher ranked of the two nations if they beat hosts Scotland with the two sides potentially swapping positions with sixth place matching Wales’ highest-ever position from earlier this year.
• Defeat by more than 15 points will see Scotland drop an extra place to ninth with Italy the beneficiaries.
• A victorious Scotland cannot improve on their current position of sixth as they will gain a maximum of 0.79 points, leaving them trailing Australia above by 1.22 points.