The World's Cup: What is Prince Harry up to?

One of the most pressing questions ahead of the big kickoff: What is Prince Harry up to? Photo / Getty Images

Steve Deane scours global media for an offbeat look at rugby's biggest show.

MAN'S MAN

The good folk at Isle of Man Today have kindly provided the answer to one of the most pressing questions as the clock ticks down to the big kickoff: What is Prince Harry up to?

Turns out Harry is going to a launch party for important types and then heading along to the first match with his brother and his missus - aka the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge.

Hazza, of course, is the honorary president of the organising committee for RWC 2015 - which presumably means he has the honour of not actually doing any organising. He did, however, chip in with a YouTube clip banging on about how rugby is not just for posh kids. England Rugby's All Schools Programme had reached its target of getting 400 state schools playing rugby, he cheerfully announced. "It's no secret that I love top flight rugby, but I'm also a passionate supporter of how powerful the grassroots game is in helping to improve people's lives." Etc.

NO LET DOWN

Canada's Cambridge Times has once again performed brilliantly in bringing rugby to its non-rugby audience in terms it can understand. Times reporters have helpfully confirmed there will be no repeat of the Tom Brady/Deflategate scandal that scarred this year's Superbowl. The six Gilbert Match XV balls for each game will be used in the captain's run the day before each match and then placed under lock and key at an undisclosed secure location.

"There should be no Deflategate at the Rugby World Cup," the Times confirmed.

NO CHANCE

Wales coach Warren Gatland is urging reporters to write off his team's chances of doing well in the World Cup. Wales are without key fullback Leigh Halfpenny and scrum-half Rhys Webb, dimming their chances of navigating the Pool of Death.

"If you can do your jobs and write us off as much as possible, that would be great," Gatland told a news conference.

No probs.

Warren, you've got no chance. Wales are, as Herald columnist Chris Rattue succinctly put it a few years back, the village idiots of world rugby. To resurrect Rattue's most stinging line: "[Wales] have fans who live for the game, administrators who've killed it and players who lie down for the cause."

That help mate?

CROYDON RIOT

Turns out the French are a lot more like us than we thought. They too think Croydon is a grim craphouse. Of course, being French, they put it rather more stylishly. Croydon, a French reporter covering the team from its four-star base in the South London borough, is "pas tres chic" (not very stylish).

For Kiwis who haven't experienced Croydon, think Hamilton with more Stalinist architecture and fewer redeeming features.

Doubtless the French are pining for things to be the way they were four years ago, when we Kiwis thoughtfully embedded them on Auckland's glorious North Shore.