Stats Don't Lie: Southern sides leading the way at Rugby World Cup

Morne Steyn is the top points scorer with 48 points. Photo / Getty Images

763,000 fans have attended the 28 Rugby World Cup matches played up to and including September 25, and they have seen 168 tries scored.

If it's tries you want to see then Pool A is the place to go, with 52 tries having been scored. New Zealand have scored the most tries (24) overall, followed by South Africa (20) in Pool D. These two teams are also the best attacking sides having scored 161 and 153 points respectively.

Pool B has seen the least number of tries with only 32 scored, and Georgia has only managed a single try after two games.

If you split the teams into Northern v Southern Hemisphere, the Southern teams have scored 92 tries while the Northern teams have scored 76. A big difference when you realise only eight of the 20 teams are situated south of the equator.

There have been six games now where the winning score has topped 50 points, with three of those games occurring in Pool C. South Africa became the first team to hold their opposition to nil when they beat Namibia 87-0, which is the biggest winning margin of RWC 2011 to date.

South Africa have the best defensive record having conceded just 19 points in three games. Next best defensively is England who have only conceded 22 points.

Morne Steyn (South Africa) is the top points scorer with 48 points made up of two tries, 13 conversions and 4 conversions. Tonga's Kurt Morath is next best with 31 points from five conversions and seven penalties.

England's Chris Ashton is the top try scorer with five, including a hattrick against Romania. Close on his heels are Adam Ashley-Cooper (Australia), Veriniki Goneva (Fiji), Israel Dagg and Richard Kahui (New Zealand) and Vincent Clerc (France) all with four tries.

Five players have scored hattricks of tries, they are Ashton, Ashley-Cooper, Clerc, Mark Cueto (England) and Alesana Tuilagi (Samoa).

Romania have conceded the most penalties (39) followed by England (38), Japan (38) and New Zealand (36). Italy has conceded the least penalties (17), but they have only played two games so far. Of the teams that have played three games, South Africa (25) and France (26) have conceded the fewest penalties.

When it comes to the referees, Alain Rolland (Ireland) has awarded the most penalties (71) at a rate of 23.66 per game. Steve Walsh (Australia) has the highest awarding rate at 25.5 penalties per game while Wayne Barnes (England) has the lowest rate, awarding penalties at 17.66 per game.

If you think that goal kicking has been a problem this competition, then you are correct. Only 57 percent of the 168 penalty attempts have made it between the uprights, with conversion attempts just slightly better with 68 percent going over.

Of the 23 attempted drop goals so far, just nine have been successful. Nambia's Theuns Kotze is the most successful having landed three from three attempts, while Wales' Rhys Priestland has failed with all three of his attempts.

The top goal kicker of the competition to date is France's Morgan Parra with a 90 per cent success rate with his place kicks. South Africa's Morne Steyn is the second best with a success rate of 85 per cent, followed by Dan Carter and Romania's Iomote Dimofte who are both on 67 percent.

The worst goal kicker of the competition so far (of those who have had more than two attempts at goal) is Russia's Yury Kushnarev at just 25 percent. But he is just one of 14 players kicking at 50 percent or below, and that list includes the likes of Felipe Contemponi, Quade Cooper and Jonny Wilkinson.

And from the Did You Know files: Tonga's Taniela Moa became the first player ever to start Rugby World Cup matches at both halfback (v New Zealand) and first-five (v Canada). France's Morgan Parra become the second player to do this, starting at halfback against Canada and first-five against New Zealand.