It is right that every rugby playing country has a chance to compete in the World Cup. International rugby was, for too long, the preserve of too few. Now the game is spreading to make it truly world wide.

But having made that point, surely the qualifying process in the World Cup is unwieldy and imbalanced. The results last weekend underlined that, with England defeating Holland by 110 points and Ireland defeating Georgia by 70 points, despite not having played very well. I fail to see what possible good that does either Georgia or Holland, other than to underline that such matches are no more than mismatches.

I am conscious that South Africa scored 96 points against an under-strength Wales last summer, and that international rugby now produces infinitely higher scores than in the past. But despite that result last summer, is there any comparison between Wales and emerging rugby nations now going into World Cup qualifying matches without a remote hope of making those matches in any way competitive? The reality is that the South African team that scored 96 points against Wales would have no difficulty scoring over 200 points against some of the nations currently playing in the World Cup qualifying tournament.

The Welsh performance last Saturday against South Africa was of an altogether different dimension, and the problem with some of the World Cup qualifying matches is that huge scores against emerging nations are a regular occurrence.

It was decided prior to the 1995 World Cup that, after that was completed, in future only three countries would automatically qualify for the finals: The reigning champions, the runners-up and the team placed third. A fourth country, in this instance Wales, also qualify as they are the hosts for next year's tournament final.

The Ireland management, and indeed the England management, will no doubt have seen the matches last Saturday as a useful exercise as they prepare for much sterner Tests against South Africa. But defeats like those inflicted on Holland, in particular, can scarcely have done much for either the morale of the Dutch squad or for the game in that country.

By all means have qualifying competitions, but an in-depth look must be taken at the process. For instance, two of the three teams in Ireland's group qualify for the finals. In fact, Ireland and Romania have already done so, irrespective of the result at Lansdowne Road tomorrow. Georgia can still qualify by coming through a repechage. So all three countries in Ireland's group can qualify. It should not be beyond RWC (Rugby World Cup) to come up with a more streamlined system of qualification.

There is no valid argument why all of the quarter-finalists in 1995 should not be exempt from qualifying. Wales, who failed to reach the last eight in 1995 had, in fact, to qualify for the 1995 tournament. Despite failing to make the quarter-finals again in 1995, Wales had managed to score 102 points in the qualifying competition against Portugal. That, I think, illustrates the imbalance.

Furthermore, increasing the number of teams in the finals to 20 and having five pools in the finals is scarcely justified. Was the decision to have five pools motivated by, and a concession to, the five nations who will have a pool each, Ireland, England, Scotland, Wales and France? Increasing the number of finalists to 20 is part of the unwieldy process we are now going through.

In 1991, Ireland and Scotland shared a pool. Why, for instance, this time could Wales and England not share a pool? Both now have six pool matches and a quarter-final each. England have both semi-finals, and Wales the play-off for third place and the final.

There is going to be even greater slaughter of the innocents than usual when the finals come around. Let us take as an illustration the position in Pool A. This group will include South Africa and almost assuredly Scotland, another European qualifier and - wait for it - the winners of repechage two. Now that is a really enticing prospect. The repechage one qualifiers will go into Pool B with New Zealand and England. I do not think it is necessary to elaborate further on what is and is seen to be a flawed qualifying process.

Leaving aside the four automatic finalists, there is a huge gap between most of the rest of the nations who must qualify and those who came through the pre-qualifying process, such as Georgia and Holland. That has already been emphasised by events last weekend.

Records are being set now in international rugby on a regular basis, both in the team and individual contexts. A few were set by Ireland last Saturday. Ireland's highest score in international rugby, beating the 60 points scored against Romania in 1986. The 10 tries scored by Ireland equalled the 10 scored against Romania. Eric Elwood set a new mark by kicking 10 conversions. That beat by three the record held by Michael Kiernan when he converted seven tries against Romania.

Three Ireland players scored on their debuts last Saturday: Pat Duignan, Girvan Dempsey and Ciaran Scally. It had never happened in the past that three Ireland players scored on their debuts in the same match, and Dempsey and Scally came on as replacements in the second half. They are two young players of immense promise and talent.

Scally's opportunities for Leinster were especially limited his season. That is more a pity than a mystery. I share the view that he is the best scrum-half in the province, just as Dempsey is the best fullback, which is where Leinster should have played him consistently.

The political situation and other factors have seen the Romanians fall a long way behind the quality they produced in the early 1980s. They have lost, and are still losing, some of their best players and indeed lost some of their best coaches too. In the early 1980s there was quite a lot of speculation about Romania entering the Five Nations Championship. So good were the results they were achieving that they looked as if they would not have been out of place in that championship. For instance, in 1980 Ireland got a very fortunate draw against them at Lansdowne Road. France (twice), Scotland and Wales all lost to Romania in that period.

The most recent match between Ireland and Romania was at Lansdowne Road in 1993 when Ireland won 25-3. Eric Elwood scored 20 points.

And, in conclusion, should Ireland win tomorrow, it will mean the first back-to-back wins for Ireland since the World Cup in 1995, when Ireland defeated Wales and Japan.