Yes, I know. This is up late, but I’ve been busy… Sorry.
Shortly before the 2019 Rugby World Cup kicked off, ESPN asked me to name my top 20 players heading to Japan. Turned out, they’d asked a few other people, who knew their rugby players, too.
The result was a list of 25 players to watch at the quadrennial tournament. And, I was lucky enough to get an email asking if I wanted to write up the piece. It sounded fun, so I said yes. I was right. It was.
Who are the best players at the tournament? We polled ESPN’s rugby journalists from around the world — Tom Hamilton, Sam Bruce, Dotun Akintoye, Craig Dowd, Patricio Connolly, Enrico Borra, James Harrington and John Goliath — to decipher who are the top 25 players appearing in Japan…
James Harrington: Freelance sports journalist 