Host Australia and three-time champion New Zealand were drawn into the same group Wednesday for the expanded Rugby World Cup in 2027, with the winner likely to meet defending champion South Africa in the quarterfinals.
No. 2-ranked New Zealand was the last team pulled out in the draw by World Rugby chairman Brett Robinson in Sydney. Australia had already been placed into Pool A from the second band of teams that were ranked from seventh to 12th.
“As an Australian, you always love to (play) New Zealand," Wallabies captain Harry Wilson said, before proposing that the Bledisloe Cup showdown should be the tournament opener. "The opening match of a World Cup, doesn't get much better than that!
“In the World Cup, if you want to win it, you’ve got to beat the best teams, and they’re obviously one of the best teams in the world.”
The All Blacks are on an 11-match winning streak against two-time World Cup champion Australia, which has slumped to No. 7 in the rankings. The Tasman rivals will be joined by Chile and Hong Kong in the group stage.
South Africa, aiming for a third consecutive title, was the next-to-last team pulled in the draw and landed in Pool B with Italy, Georgia and Romania.
The result means the 2023 finalists could meet in the quarterfinals, if both the Springboks and the All Blacks top their groups.
“We are pleased with the pool we have been drawn in, but this is a World Cup and every team will go out there with great passion and do their utmost to represent their nations with pride,” Springbok coach Rassie Erasmus said in a statement. "There have been surprises in the tournament before, so we’ll need to be up mentally and physically for every match.”
England, winner of the last Rugby World Cup staged in Australia in 2003, was drawn into Pool F with Wales, Tonga and Zimbabwe.
England head coach Steve Borthwick refused to be drawn on potential opponents beyond the group stage and expressed caution.
“We know the margins in the knockout games, with so many decided by less than three points," Borthwick said.
No. 6 Argentina was drawn into Pool C with Fiji, Spain and Canada, while three-time finalist France will face Japan, the United States and Samoa in Pool E. Ireland is in Pool D with Scotland, Uruguay and Portugal.
“There's a lot of matchups — England-Wales, Ireland-Scotland — there's a lot of clumps that are going to be teams that know each other, and play each other often," Australia head coach Joe Schmidt said. New Zealand will "be looking at Australia and thinking, 'Well, at least we're going to know who we're up against.'
"It's a trans-Tasman battle which I think both teams are going to love having.”
France coach Fabien Galthié said his side can win the tournament after falling short as favorite on home soil in 2023, when it was agonizingly beaten by one point in the quarterfinals by South Africa.
"Yes, that’s our ambition. In a very clear manner I say yes," Galthié said. “France has never done it and that’s our ambition. To be forever the first. The pressure is always there in a way and that's normal."
Galthié was pleased with the draw, even though he struck a cautious note.
“The team we know best is Japan, we'll actually be facing them in Tokyo this summer," he said. "It's a group that appears manageable to us. It's perfect for building momentum.”
The runner-up in Pool A will meet the runner-up in Pool E, likely Japan, in the Round of 16 and likely England in the quarterfinals. The winners of Pools C and D are seeded to meet in the quarterfinals.
The French are seeded to top Pool E, which would set up a last-16 match against the runner-up in Pool D and a likely quarterfinal against the winner of the second-place teams in Pool C and Pool F.
The tournament was expanded to 24 teams for the 2027 edition, which kicks off in Perth on Oct. 1 and culminates in a Nov. 13 final in Sydney.
The teams were divided into four bands of six based on World Rugby rankings at the time of the draw. Each of the six pools contain one team from each of the four bands.
The Australians, World Cup winners in 1991 and ’99 and runners-up the last time the tournament was played Down Under, missed a seeding in the top six after their first winless November tour to Europe since 1958.
The addition of four teams in the draw means the tournament will have a Round of 16 for the first time, a stage that World Rugby chairman Robinson predicted “brings greater jeopardy, earlier knockout drama, and even more entertainment from the opening matches.”
AP rugby: https://apnews.com/hub/rugby
South Africa's Jesse Kriel, center, with teammates waves to supporters following the rugby union Nations Series match between Ireland and South Africa in Dublin, Ireland, Saturday, Nov. 22, 2025. (AP Photo/Peter Morrison)
Australia's Harry Potter catches the ball during the rugby union Nations Series match between France and Australia in Saint-Denis, outside Paris, Saturday, Nov. 22, 2025. (AP Photo/Christophe Ena)
NEW YORK (AP) — The U.S. stock market is flirting with its all-time high on Friday.
The S&P 500 rose 0.5% and is on track to squeak past its record closing level, which was set in late October. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 238 points, or 0.5%, as of 10:15 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.6% higher.
If the S&P 500 finishes the day at an all-time high, it would be just the latest time the U.S. stock market has powered past what appeared to be a debilitating set of worries. Most recently, those concerns centered on what the Federal Reserve will do with interest rates, whether too many dollars are flowing into artificial-intelligence technology and if sharp drops for cryptocurrencies would bleed over into other markets.
Ulta Beauty helped lead the way on Friday and jumped 11% after the retailer reported stronger profit and revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected. CEO Kecia Steelman said its customers are broadly feeling pressure, but Ulta saw growth across its categories, particularly in e-commerce. It raised its forecast for revenue over the full year.
Another encouraging signal for the holiday shopping season came from Victoria’s Secret & Co. It reported a milder loss for the latest quarter than analysts expected, and it likewise raised its forecast for sales over the full year. Its stock jumped 20.4%.
Warner Bros. Discovery was also strong and rose 3.2%. Netflix said it would buy Warner Bros. for $72 billion in cash and stock following the pending split for the company behind HBO Max, “Casablanca” and “Harry Potter” from Discovery Global.
The deal between the two giants could raise fears about too much industry power residing in one company, though, meaning it may not be a sure thing. After initially falling more than 5%, Netflix's stock pared its drop to a dip of 0.2%.
Paramount Skydance, which earlier had been seen as a front-runner to buy Warner Bros., fell 6.3%.
Also on the losing end of Wall Street was Hewlett Packard Enterprise. It slipped 0.6% after reporting weaker revenue for the latest quarter than analysts forecast, though its profit topped expectations.
The U.S. stock market broadly has been much quieter this week. It’s a respite following earlier weeks of sharp and scary swings.
After some back and forth, the widespread expectation among traders is that the Fed will cut its main interest rate next week in hopes of shoring up the slowing U.S. job market. If it does, that would be the third cut of the year, and such expectations have been a major reason the S&P 500 has climbed back toward its record.
Investors love lower interest rates because they boost prices for investments and can juice the economy. The downside is that they can worsen inflation, which is stubbornly remaining above the Fed’s 2% target.
A set of economic reports released on Friday did little to change expectations for a coming cut. One report said that an underlying measure of inflation that the Fed prefers to use was at 2.8% in September, exactly as economists expected.
A separate report said U.S. consumers appear to be bracing for less-bad inflation in the coming year. They're now forecasting 4.1% inflation for the year ahead, down from their forecast of 4.5% last month, and the lowest reading since January, according to the University of Michigan. That's important because when expectations for inflation are doing the opposite and rising, it can create a vicious cycle that only worsens inflation.
In the bond market, Treasury yields held relatively steady. The yield on the 10-year Treasury remained at 4.11%, where it was late Thursday.
In stock markets abroad, indexes rose across much of Europe and Asia.
Germany’s DAX returned 0.9%, and South Korea’s Kospi jumped 1.8% for two of the world’s bigger gains.
Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 fell 1.1% after data showed household spending in Japan fell 3.0% in October from a year earlier. It was the sharpest drop since January 2024. Japanese markets have been shaky recently after the Bank of Japan hinted that hikes to interest rates may be coming.
AP Writer Teresa Cerojano contributed.
Options trader Joseph D'Arrigo works on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Tuesday, Dec. 2, 2025. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)
Currency traders work near a screen showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) and the foreign exchange rate between U.S. dollar and South Korean won, top right, at the foreign exchange dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters, in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, Dec. 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)
Currency traders watch monitors near a screen showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) and the foreign exchange rate between U.S. dollar and South Korean won, top right, at the foreign exchange dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters, in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, Dec. 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)
Currency traders pass by a screen showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI), top center left, and the foreign exchange rate between U.S. dollar and South Korean won, top center, at the foreign exchange dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters, in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, Dec. 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)
