Tonga face Namibia on Tuesday with their aim reset on finishing third in Pool C to seal automatic qualification for the 2019 World Cup while the southern Africans will simply be after a first-ever win.
Tonga went down to a shock 17-10 defeat by Georgia in their opening match, throwing the scrap for third place wide open behind heavyweights New Zealand and Argentina.
While Tonga mathematically remain in the hunt for second place, they have still to play the All Blacks and the Pumas, who finish up their pool campaign against Namibia.
Namibia have made eight changes to the starting line-up that lost 58-14 to New Zealand last week.
Indefatigable Saracens flanker Jacques Burger will captain the side coached by Welshman Phil Davies to make his 10th World Cup appearance, which leaves him one shy of the team record of 11 held by Hugo Horn.
Tonga, an ever-present at the World Cup bar one absence in 1991, have nine changes, coach Mana Otai explaining that decision by pointing to the short timespan between the next games.
“There’s always been a plan about how we take on these four games and take into consideration the two four-day turnarounds in the upcoming two games, but having said that, we also take into consideration now the situation that we’re in,” Otai said.
“We haven’t had success in the last game against Georgia, so we’re making sure that we address this game first and foremost, hence the changes. This is the team that we believe is going to do the job in the game coming up against Namibia.
“On the day we’ve got to be prepared, regardless of who we’re playing and I think we learned our lessons from Georgia.”
Otai warned that their favourites’ tag would count for nothing following England’s 28-25 defeat by Wales.
“It could have been either one’s game, but if you look at the build-up to it, I think the favourites were England — we’re in the same dilemma (being favourites)… It highlighted that at the World Cup anything could happen.”
Namibia coach Davies warned that his team faced a tough test against the South Sea islanders.
“The Tongans have had a good rest. There will be a lot of emotion flying around their team and they will be very physical,” the former Llanelli and Wales forward said.
“They are number 11 in the world and we are number 20. That’s a huge difference, so it will be a massive, massive challenge for us.”
Davies said many positives could be taken from their defeat by champions New Zealand.
“There was inevitable excitement about our performance but this is a level-headed group,” Davies said.
“I was pleased with the performance but a bit disappointed that we didn’t impose ourselves a bit earlier.”