Tomaz Morais has named the 30 players who will go down in history as the first squad to represent Portugal in a Rugby World Cup. It's an occasion their inspirational young coach admits he never thought would become a reality.

Portugal ensured their place at the finals in March with a dramatic one-point aggregate 24-23 victory Uruguay in the repechage – despite losing the second leg 18-12 in Montevideo. It made them the 20th and final qualifiers and their reward is a place in Pool C alongside tournament favourites New Zealand, Scotland, Italy and Romania – the latter posing their best chance of a debut victory.

The World Cup will be a challenge for the Portuguese but Morais knows his team will continue to give their all.

'The World Cup will be a challenge for the Portuguese but Morais knows his team will continue to give their all'


Flanker John Barclay is the only uncapped player in Scotlandcoach Frank Hadden’s squad, which will be captained by Jason White following his return to the international stage against Ireland last weekend.
Barclay has played for Scotland at age grade and A level – the latter during this year’s Barclays Churchill Cup – and will celebrate his 21st birthday the day after Scotland face New Zealand at Murrayfield on September 23.

However, while Barclay is one of 20 squad members looking forward to their first-ever appearance on the World Cup stage, Scotland’s most-capped player Scott Murray and fly-half Chris Paterson will be playing in their third tournament.

Romeo Gontineac will become the first Romanian to play in four World Cups after the 71-Test centre was named in coach Daniel Santamans’ 30-man squad. Gontineac, who like many of the squad plays his club rugby in France, has played 10 times for Romania on the World Cup stage and captained his country at the last tournament in Australia four years ago.

However, he is not the only member of Santamans’ squad to boast World Cup experience, 14 others having played in 2003 with the likes of Petru Balan, Razvan Mavrodin, Gabriel Brezoianu and Ionut Tofan returning for their third tournament.

Many of the squad played in the IRB Nations Cup held in Bucharest earlier this summer – when Romania beat Italy A and Namibia – with young scrum-half Valentin Calafeteanu among those to catch the eye with impressive performances.

Italy’s inspirational scrum-half Alessandro Troncon will be playing in his fourth Rugby World Cup after being named in head coach Pierre Berbizier’s 30-man squad. Troncon has played in 10 matches across the last three tournaments – all bar one of them in the starting line-up – and is expected to reach a century of Test appearances for Italy at the 2007 tournament.

The scrum-half currently  could reach the historic milestone against Portugal in their penultimate Pool C match in Paris on September 19.

Three other players in Berbizier’s squad have more than 50 caps to their name - captain Marco Bortolami, Andrea Lo Cicero and Mauro Bergamasco, the flanker who played in both the 1999 and 2003 World Cups.
This quartet of players are among 13 who were involved in Italy’s campaign at Rugby World Cup 2003 and this experience will be vital as a nation buoyed by their best-ever Six Nations Championship finish target a first-ever quarter-final appearance.

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