With two rounds and four games remaining, the 2025 and possibly last edition of The Rugby Championship in this format is going down to the wire.
Australia leads the way by one bonus point over South Africa and New Zealand, with Argentina two points behind.
To take out overall honours though, they will have to navigate a tough final fortnight of Bledisloe Cup action, starting this weekend in their house of horrors Eden Park.
South Africa and Argentina will renew their rivalry when they face off in Durban with both feeling quite confident about their ability to finish the tournament on top.
Find our previews and best bets for both games below as we close out the closest version of this competition in its history.
Let’s not waste any time running through Australia’s awful history at Eden Park, we all know about it and just what this current version of the Wallabies are up against.
Even at their peak around the turn of the millennium, they just could not find a way past the All Blacks at their spiritual home ground.
However, there is a reason to feel optimistic about this current iteration of the Wallabies, maybe not enough to back them to win at $4.80 but they just don’t seem likely to be blown out like they have been in the past.
For starters, this is a weaker than normal New Zealand team that has lost its captain Scott Barrett to a shoulder injury, although they have enough depth that the replacements will still be more than capable.
But over the last 12 months we have seen Australia develop a resilience that has been missing and Joe Schmidt almost deserves an OAM for his work salvaging this team from the Eddie Jones doldrums.
A drought breaking win in England last year was followed by an epic Lions series, not to mention that come from behind victory in South Africa.
Even on slightly smaller stages, the Wallabies have managed to grind out wins in games where they have not been playing that well including Fiji and Argentina in the last couple of months.
They seem to be better suited to win the first of a two game series in this tournament as well, so I like their chances of at least putting the fear of god into New Zealand even if it falls short.
I just can’t back against the six plus decades of history and take Australia to win, but I am happy to back a close game that they keep close.
Back against Argentina at your own peril, but that is exactly what I am doing here, I just don’t see this one being all that close.
The Pumas gave it their all in Australia in their last two games, but could only split the series and there were more than a few signs that they may struggle to compete for 80 minutes in this game.
South Africa just completely dominated New Zealand in their last outing, inflicting a historic 43-10 defeat on the All Blacks.
It has been a decade since Argentina won in South Africa, posting a 37-25 win back in the 2015 Rugby Championship.
Last year this equivalent game finished 48-7 and another convincing South African win looks like the best play.