When was the rfu founded

The Welsh Rugby Union was founded. The size of a rugby field was standardized at x 75 yards. The score system was established. The weight of a rugby ball was limited to between 13 and William Webb Ellis, the inventor of rugby football In November of at Rugby School, an independent school in England, a boy named William Webb Ellis, gripped by a great rush of enthusiasm while playing football, began to run toward the opposing team's goal but holding the ball in his arms, ignoring the basic 'no-hands' rule of football.

Blackheath Rugby Club resigned from the newly formed Football Association because of irreconcilable differences in their interpretation of how to play football.

The Cambridge Rules eliminated certain aspects of the game that Blackheath, and others, favoured i. Up to this time, there had been no regulation, no rules as such, the number of players per side was uncontrolled and games often ended up looking like a huge rolling maul with a ball somewhere in the middle!

Despite the lack of regulation, rugby clubs flourished though schools, colleges and universities, hospitals, the civil service. The military took the game out to the colonies while at home, the working classes of the industrial north of England were well represented. The story moves on to the formation of the Rugby Football Union following the example set by the Football Association note: now soccer , but the whole story of football based games also includes the split within the ranks of the RFU and the creation of Rugby League and overseas, of how the original Rugby Rules were interpreted and adapted to give rise to Aussie Rules and American Football.

In Ireland , Gaelic Football came to the fore developed along its own distinct line and with it, we have the six distinctive variants of the game of football. In a letter to the press in , Richmond also wanted to see these elements of the game dropped. As a result, hacking gradually disappeared from the game after both Blackheath and Richmond refused to play opponents who continued to play with hacking as part of their game.

It was the Secretary of the Richmond club, Edwin Ash, who called for the rules of the game to be standardised in another letter to the press. Consequently, a meeting was arranged to eliminate the more violent aspects of the game early in ; the Rugby Football Union was established in the Pall Mall Restaurant in Charing Cross and involved representatives from 21 leading clubs. As an aside, the representative from London Wasps was invited to this first meeting, but failed to turn up.

There are different versions of events to explain his absence; either Wasps sent their man to the wrong place on the wrong day, or he went to a restaurant with the same name, had a few too many drinks and was incapable of finding the right venue when the mistake came to light! The original 'Drunken Wasp'? The other attendees were: Guy's Hospital the oldest recognised rugby club, founded in , Blackheath and Harlequins, plus representative from Wellington and King's College, St.

Paul 's School and a team from the Civil Service. You must admit, there are some great names in there! The first job of the RFU was to form a committee consisting of three former students of Rugby School, all from the legal profession, who were tasked with setting down the first formalised laws for rugby union notice 'laws' as opposed to 'rules' - well what do you expect from lawyers?

However, trouble was brewing in the northern clubs where rugby had a strong following in the working classes. Opret profil. Bliv medlem Tilmelding. The Rugby World Cup. The first Rugby World Cup was played in and was held in Australia and New Zealand - both semi-finals were played in Australia while the final was played in New Zealand, with the All Blacks defeating France in the final. Australia won the tournament by defeating France in the final after France had made a massive come back by defeating the All Blacks in the semi-finals.

Australia hosted the 5th tournament, and for the 3rd time in world cup history made it to the finals. Most rugby fans will remember this final game, as it was extremely closely fought, going in to extra time, and England ultimately winning after an epic last minute drop goal by Johnny Wilkinson.

Madden and C. Pope represented the club at the first meeting of the Rugby Football Union less than two years later on 26th January, They probably changed at the Mitford Castle, just outside the park gates. By the mids the club had built a solid fixture card, playing most of the big London teams including Kensington, Richmond, Rosslyn Park, Wasps and, of course, all of the teaching hospitals.

But even at this time the club was suffering from the trials and tribulations that were the curse of most hospital sides — the big clubs would poach their best players and any promising students would leave on graduation. This clarion call seemed to work — in , due to the inspired efforts of enthusiastic students and staff, the club entered the most successful decade in its history. The hospital won no less than ten out of thirteen games played in and reached the final of the Hospital Cup for the first time in their history, losing to a strong St.

This last game, against St. One of these years, though, does deserve a special mention, as it brought with it the ultimate nightmare for any hospital side. The club did, however, somehow manage to survive! Michael Brudenell, the hospital had their best season for 25 years — 25 won out of 35 played. The club also reached the semi-final of the Hospital Challenge Cup, suffering a narrow defeat to their old adversaries, St. In the famous clubhouse on Dog Kennel Hill, which had been in use since , was lost to fire.

The hospital soon built new facilities — but they were only to last until , when, due to monetary problems, the site was sold to a supermarket for development. These days they are still going strong — playing in the Kent Leagues at Dulwich Village, on facilities provided by the Hospital.

Click here for the Lausanne Rugby Shirt. Law Club produced three England players with nine caps between them, but S. Morse and E. C Cheston are shown in the record books in and Marlborough Nomads and Richmond players respectively. They were a closed club for members of the legal profession. Click here for the Law Club Rugby Shirt. The college team itself was founded only six years earlier in The Marlborough College football side was second only to Rugby School in the influence they had on early Rugby football.

The college rules were very similar to the rules of Rugby School, upon which the first laws of rugby union with based, and in one respect were even more advanced — they excluded hacking. Founded by all boys Mr. They played most of there games in London. In the —91 season the club found themselves a private ground at Surbiton.

The Nomads finally moved to Thames Ditton in The Marlborough Nomads first game was played in against Richmond at Richmond, of course! After this inauspicious start, the club went from strength to strength, soon taking on all of the powerful sides of the day — not only Richmond, but also West Kent, Gipsies and Ravenscourt Park.

This culminated in a famous victory over Blackheath the best Metropolitan side at that time in Marlborough Nomads were disbanded in , and the team will invited by Rosslyn Park to join them, which they did. Founded in it was one of the earliest of the old boys Rugby clubs to be established. Like most clubs it had its ups and downs and was at one time one of the strongest metropolitan clubs of the day. Click here for the Marlborough Nomads Rugby Shirt. Click here for the Mohicans Rugby Shirt.

They are also the only metropolitan club never to have been beaten by London Scottish — having disbanded before the Scots could avenge several defeats! The emigration of Cameron Hewitt and Fred and Sydney Fry to Canada, together with the retirement of Tom Fry, took away the heart of the team, and it was decided to dissolve the club rather than let it enter into slow decline. But have perhaps the most famous member of the club was George Rowland Hill, who later went on to become a pillar of the RFU establishment.

Hill served the Union as honorary secretary for 23 years — and was the 18th president — The nearest stations to the area were Turnham Green and Shaftesbury Road. Click here for Ravenscourt Park Rugby Shirt. Richmond Football Club was founded in by Edwin Ash whilst he was at the military cramming college at Streatham Lodge to play the few other teams Rugby and Association rules that had sprung up in and around London at that time.

The Green was and still is crisscrossed with paths, which meant that their pitch narrowed quite noticably at one end. The club also had the usual common land problems regarding right-of-way with many irate Richmond folk — and their dogs! The club adopted their famous gold, red and black jerseys in after E. Holmes, the captain that season, copied the colours of a detachment of the Belgium Army he had admired on parade in London.

In December, , Edwin Ash and B. Rutter and E. He was also the captain of Cambridge University, Middlesex and, between and , England. In , the club moved to what is still their home, the Richmond Athletic Ground, and it was here that Richmond became the first English club to host the All Blacks touring side in Langton and H. Millett it quickly re-established itself as one of the elite London clubs in the s. The club played its usual active part in international, county and club Rugby between the wars under its charismatic captain, and later secretary, R.

When the game became open the club was very quickly identified as a potential money-maker and Richmond became the first fully professional club in They were quickly promoted to the new Premiere Division — but only three years later their millionaire backer withdrew his support and the club crashed into administration. Rugby carried on whilst the club was in administration and a new company was formed to rescue it.

Money was raised by many past and present members who were determined not to see their famous old club vanish. In the 1st XV were re-introduced into the leagues by the RFU at level nine and they have been promoted in nearly every subsequent season. The School colours were originally chocolate and magenta hooped jerseys and stockings. These were later changed to all white. By the late s a movement that extolled the kind of moral and religious leadership typified by Dr.

Finding himself in broad agreement with Dr. Arnold although disliking some of the rougher aspects of the Rugby game — and hacking in particular Mr. Kynaston, the High Master of St. This was a popular move amongst the boys and by the s St. The team elected mathematics teacher Mr. Hadley as its first president, and also appointed three vice-presidents one of whom was the Surmaster.

The rest of the committee, including the captain andsecretary, were all boys. In those days matches were played home and away and the season lasted from late September until March, usually consisting of about sixteen matches. In the school moved away from St. The school now had three pitches on their own playing fields at the rear of the buildings. In the school bought a playing field at Wormwood Scrubs toprovide extra facilities for themselves and the Old Pauline Club, and in another ground with four more pitches was aquired in Ealing to be used as a secondary ground by the school.

By the school was running four senior teams plus Under 16s and Under 15s. During the Second World War St. When the Rugby Football Union celebrated its centenary on 16th January, , eight of the clubs still in existence from the original twenty-one held a grand banquet in the Guildhall.

At this celebration the grace before dinner was said by the High Master of St. It quickly became one of the great national boarding schools. The following account of Wellington football in the early days is taken from the recollections of J. Bevir who was at Wellington as a pupil between and He retired in Nineteen were so chosen that Autumn, and three more added in February… It must be remembered that the school only started in , so that the oldest player could not have been much over 15 and consequently it was not thought fit to give that distinction to more than a limited number… By the number of caps given was 25 and in the following year this was reduced to 20, from which time onwards a complete list of the teams was published.

In the star in the dormitory cap was replaced by a velvet cap with a dormitory badge on it. The dormitory symbols were: Blucher — Silver and Orange Fleur de lis. Anglesea — Silver and light blue star with eight points. Beresford — Brown and gold horseshoe. Hill — Silver and black skull and crossbones. Lynedoch — Gold and green maltese cross. Hopetoun — Gold and purple crescent and star.

Murray — Gold and crimson crescent… To these were added later: Orange — Gold and black two-headed eagle. Hardinge — Gold and dark blue anchor. Combermere — Silver and blue lion rampant. Some of these caps, especially the Blucher, were extremely expensive, and as few fellows wore one when they had left Wellington all the caps were made of black velvet with the badge in gold…. It is interesting to glance at the matches during the first decade.