Cape Town - SA Rugby CEO Jurie Roux has urged Ireland to 'take the moral high ground' in their reaction to World Rugby's recommendation that South Africa hosts the 2023 Rugby World Cup.

The sport's governing body announced on Tuesday that, after having conducted an independent consultation, it would recommend to its council that South Africa be selected as the host nation for the showpiece in 2023.

While the happenings of Tuesday do not guarantee South Africa the tournament, they go a long way given that the 39 votes that are to be cast ahead of the November 15 announcement will come from the World Rugby Council.

Ireland, who had been considered the favourites to host the tournament before Tuesday, actually finished in third place behind France after World Rugby's assessment of the bids.

Yet, minutes after the recommendation was made public, Ireland Rugby confirmed that they still believed they could host the tournament.

While Roux acknowledged that nothing had been finalised yet, he hoped that nothing "untoward" would happen in the days leading up to November 15.

"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 (on November 15) and hope that everybody has made the right decision."