Rugby-Lesser lights benefitting from financial help -World Rugby

LONDON, Sept 10 (Reuters) - Closing the competiveness gap between the haves and the have-nots of the international game through investment and support remains a priority for World Rugby, the governing body said on Thursday. Ten second-tier rugby nations will compete at the Rugby World Cup which starts next week, with lesser lights such as Georgia, Uruguay and Japan mixing it with heavyweights New Zealand, England, Australia and South Africa. World Rugby said it had injected approximately 34 million pounds ($52.33 million) between 2012 and 2015 into the 10 Rugby World Cup participating tier two nations -- Canada, Fiji, Georgia, Japan, Namibia, Romania, Samoa, Tonga, Uruguay and the United States. World Rugby chief executive Brett Gosper said: "Rugby World Cup is the financial engine that drives the development and competitiveness of the global game and the continued commercial success of tournament has enabled World Rugby to invest a record 192 million pounds in the sustainability and growth of the game worldwide between 2012 and 2015. "This is particularly beneficial for our high performance tier two unions as it has enabled an unprecedented 50 million pounds to be ring-fenced specifically for high performance initiatives in order that they can perform to their full potential at England 2015." England open the Sept.18-Oct.31 tournament when they take on Fiji in Pool A at Twickenham next Friday. ($1 = 0.6497 pounds) (Reporting by Justin Palmer, editing by Alan Baldwin)