"A thoroughly researched and comprehensive guide to the 2019 Rugby World Cup, to be held in Japan in September. The sporting highlight of the year, with teams from England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland all competing for the coveted William Webb Ellis trophy. The book will provide the reader with all the information and insight needed to understand and enjoy the competition. All 20 national teams involved are analysed and assessed on their chances of success, the star players are featured and each coach's basic strategies outlined and explained. With this book, the reader will have a handy, competent source of information on hand both before the start and especially whilst the tournament proceeds to its thrilling conclusion." --

A stunning visual history of the Rugby World Cup, with stories from on and off the pitch.

From the myth of William Webb Ellis to the glory of the 2003 World Cup win, this book explores the social history of rugby union in England. Ever since Tom Brown’s Schooldays the sport has seen itself as the guardian of traditional English middle-class values. In this fascinating new history, leading rugby historian Tony Collins demonstrates how these values have shaped the English game, from the public schools to mass spectator sport, from strict amateurism to global professionalism. Based on unprecedented access to the official archives of the Rugby Football Union, and drawing on an impressive array of sources from club minutes to personal memoirs and contemporary literature, the book explores in vivid detail the key events, personalities and players that have made English rugby. From an era of rapid growth at the end of the nineteenth century, through the terrible losses suffered during the First World War and the subsequent ‘rush to rugby’ in the public and grammar schools, and into the periods of disorientation and commercialisation in the 1960s through to the present day, the story of English rugby union is also the story of the making of modern England. Like all the very best writers on sport, Tony Collins uses sport as a prism through which to better understand both culture and society. A ground-breaking work of both social history and sport history, A Social History of English Rugby Union tells a fascinating story of sporting endeavour, masculine identity, imperial ideology, social consciousness and the nature of Englishness.

As Britain’s Empire went to war in August 1914, rugby players were the first to volunteer. They led from the front and paid a disproportionate price. In 1919, a grateful Mother Country hosted a rugby tournament: sevens teams at eight venues, playing 17 matches to declare a first ‘world champion’. There had never been an international team tournament like it. For the first time teams from Australia, Canada, New Zealand, South Africa, Britain and France were assembled in one place. Rugby held the first ever ‘World Cup’. It was a moment of triumph, a celebration of military victory, of Commonwealth and Allied unity, and of rugby values, moral and physical. In 2015 the tournament returns to England as the world remembers the Centenary of the Great War. Values of teamwork, respect, discipline were forged and tested in war – and enjoyment of rugby helped men through it. With a foreword by Jason Leonard, this is the story of rugby’s journey through the First World War to its first World Cup, and how those values endure today. 'After The Final Whistle' is shortlisted for the 2016 Cross Sports Book of the Year award.

Rugby has always been a sport with as much drama off the field as on it. For every thrilling last-minute Jonny Wilkinson drop-goal to win the world cup or Jonah Lomu rampage down the touchline for a try, there has been a split, a feud or a controversy. The Oval World is the first full-length history of rugby on a world scale – from its origins in the village-based football games of medieval times up to the globalised sport of the twenty-first century,now played in well over 100 countries. It tells the story of how a game played in an obscure English public school became the winter sport of the British Empire, spread to France, Argentina, Japan and the rest of the world and commanded a global television audience of over four billion for the last world cup final. And how American football – and other games such as Australian, Canadian and Gaelic football – emerged from rugby and highlight just how much the modern gridiron game owes to its English cousin. Featuring the great moments in the game's history and its great names – such as Jonah Lomu, David Duckham, Serge Blanco, Billy Boston and David Campese alongside Rupert Brooke, King George V, Boris Karloff, Charles de Gaulle and Nelson Mandela – The Oval World investigates just what it is about rugby that enables it to survive and thrive in countries with very different traditions and cultures. This is the the definitive world history of a truly global rugby.

Argentina made history at Rugby World Cup 2007 by finishing third in the world. The South American nation finished the World Cup ahead of traditional powers including Australia, Ireland, New Zealand, Scotland, Wales and hosts France - all have previously hosted matches in multiple World Cup tournaments. In finishing third in 2007, Argentina became the only Rugby World Cup semi finalist who has not yet hosted a Rugby World Cup.Since then rugby has undergone significant changes to at last adjust to professionalism. Now a part of The Rugby Championship Argentina is a rugby nation in rapid transition and Argentina has officially been accepted as an elite team backed by a responsible union. With England hosting in 2015 and Japan in 2019, it will be time for a Southern Hemisphere country to host in 2023. By 2023 Oceania would have hosted three World Cup's, Africa one, Asia one and Europe four and the Americas zero. Rich in tradition and packed with talent Argentina 2023 is certain to be a roaring success.

In March 1871 the first international match took place between England and Scotland at Raeburn Place in Edinburgh. Donned in all white the fledgling England team lost that day 0-1 but it was the start of remarkable history. This Rugby Football Union (RFU) product is written by the curator of the World Rugby Museum, Phil McGowan, and recounts the story of how the England team (and rugby itself) grew from an amateur collection of public schoolboys playing in a 'Home Nations Championship' into the globally recognised team they are today, watched by 80,000 at Twickenham and millions on television.