Give up, you’ve lost.

South African Rugby CEO Jurie Roux has asked both Ireland and France to admit defeat and pull out of the race to host the 2023 Rugby World Cup.

Roux was speaking following the announcement yesterday by World Rugby that they officially recommend that South Africa hosts the 2023 Rugby World Cup.

Jurie Roux believes Ireland and France would be better served to bow out of the contest at this stage, instead of canvassing for votes for what has been deemed to be an inferior bid:

“Hopefully Ireland and France, like us, will stick to the moral high ground,” Roux said.

“You can’t add any more information, you can’t present to anybody, you can’t do any more presentations, all you can do is ask for the process to take its normal course and hopefully not be part of anything untoward.

“What we will do is keep on feeding information on our bid and the fact that we’re grateful that we’re over the first hurdle.

“Other than that, we honestly can’t do anything other than walk into the council meeting and hope that everybody has made the right decision.”