Rugby World Title

Red Stag: Here's a trivia question. If the World Champ was a title that was passed from team to team once they beat the current Champions (like boxing or wrestling) who would be the current World Championship holders be - starting point is NZ winners in 1987?

Without working it all the way back, we came to the conclusion that South Africa were almost definitely the current Champions. Anyway, I'm bored and trying not to think about my job interview later today, so I decided to get to work on the path of the Rugby World Title. I used England in 2003 as my starting point (because they would have won the World Title with the World Cup), and come up with this so far. I've got to the 2007 World Cup final, but I thought I'd post what I had now.

And to all those people are going to tell me I have too much time on my hands: 1, yes I do and; 2, it doesn't actually take all that long so

01/01/04 - England
06/03/04 - Ireland (England 13 - 19 Ireland)
12/06/04 - South Africa (South Africa 31 - 17 Ireland)
24/07/04 - New zealand (New Zealand 23 - 21 South Africa)
07/08/04 - Australia (Australia 23 - 18 New Zealand)
22/08/04 - South Africa (South Africa 23 - 19 Australia)
13/11/04 - Ireland (Ireland 17 - 12 South Africa)
12/03/05 - France (Ireland 19 - 26 France)
25/06/05 - South Africa (South Africa 27 - 13 France)
27/08/05 - New Zealand (New Zealand 31 - 27 South Africa)
03/09/06 - South Africa (South Africa 21 - 20 New Zealand)
11/11/06 - Ireland (Ireland 32 - 15 South Africa)
11/02/07 - France (Ireland 17 - 20 France)
11/03/07 - England (England 26 - 18 France)
17/03/07 - Wales (Wales 27 - 18 England)
26/05/07 - Australia (Australia 29 - 23 Wales)
16/06/07 - South Africa (South Africa 22 - 19 Australia)
23/06/07 - New Zealand (South Africa 21 - 26 New Zealand)
30/06/07 - Australia (Australia 20 - 15 New Zealand)
21/07/07 - New Zealand (New Zealand 26 - 12 Australia)
06/10/07 - France (France 20 - 18 New Zealand)
13/10/07 - England (England 14 - 9 France)
20/10/07 - South Africa (England 6 - 15 South Africa)
05/07/08 - New Zealand (New Zealand 19 - 8 South Africa)
12/07/08 - South Africa (New Zealand 28 - 30 South Africa)
19/07/08 - Australia (Australia 16 - 9 South Africa)
02/08/08 - New Zealand (New Zealand 39 - 10 Australia)
13/06/09 - France (New Zealand 22 - 27 France)
20/06/09 - New Zealand (New Zealand 14 - 10 France)
26/07/09 - South Africa (South Africa 28 - 19 New Zealand)
05/09/09 - Australia (Australia 21 - 6 South Africa)
19/09/09 - New Zealand (New Zealand 33 - 6 Australia)
30/10/10 - Australia (New Zealand 24 - 26 Australia)
13/11/10 - England (England 35 - 16 Australia)
30/11/10 - South Africa (England 11 - 21 South Africa)

The Barbarians could have won the award in late 2009, but if we're going down that road then England would have taken it off them, lost it and won it back from Australia and lost it to the Maori in the space of the month. I decided to only allow the thing to be contested between IRB ranked test playing nations.

It sounds more like passing the HOT POTATO to me.

That's basically what it is. It's called the Rugby World Title because it is like a Boxing World Title, where you have to beat the Champion to win it. It's just in case this kind of thing interests you, and I seem to have made gcBlues day anyway!

I think you should take this back to the 1987 final as your starting point

That'll keep you quiet for a while

Hi robbo, not sure if you've seen this before but it might be of interest http://www.espnscrum.com/2011-rugby-world-cup/rugby/story/134739.html

It's called the Raeburn Shield and it's exactly what you mention above unfortunately i can't get a full list of teams who've won.

Someone mentioned that there was one, but we couldn't find details on it. Cheers

No worries, there is an actual website about it but i can't get it to work...

Again though like in most things the AB's are the top team in this comp too.