From The Vaults

01 August 2022

1996: The year that changed Rugby Union forever

When the rugby union game was thrown open to professionalism suddenly if not entirely unexpectedly at the conclusion of the 1995 Rugby World Cup in South Africa, a myriad of conflicting forces was unleashed...

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01 August 2022

1996: The year that changed Rugby Union forever

When the rugby union game was thrown open to professionalism suddenly if not entirely unexpectedly at the conclusion of the 1995 Rugby World Cup in South Africa, a myriad of conflicting forces was unleashed...

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18 July 2022

Legendary Four Nations tries

Rugby lovers over the last sixty years have been fortunate to grow up with a visual library of the great tries from the International Championship now readily available on video, DVD and YouTube. But what of the great tries of the pre-visual era which can only be recalled from grainy newspaper reports of long ago and, much more rarely, even grainier pre and post-World War One highlights footage from Pathe News?

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23 May 2022

Crossing the andes: Los Pumas to Chile

Eduardo García Sáenz pays a tribute to the 1936 Argentinian touring team...

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16 May 2022

The Tour from Hell

When rugby union embraced professionalism at the end of the 1995 Rugby World Cup in South Africa, a sea change took place in the nature and number of contacts and matches for players, clubs and international teams...

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14 February 2022

The Wales tour of the Pacific Islands, 1986

In the summer of 1986, with professionalism still almost ten years away, the Welsh Rugby Union sent a touring party of 25 players to the south seas to play six matches in Fiji, Tonga and Western Samoa...

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17 January 2022

The First Golden Age Of Australian Rugby

Rugby union in Australia suffered hugely in the aftermath of the First World War, but as the 1920s progressed, the sport gradually re-established its foothold...

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13 August 2021

‘The Rugby Championship of the World’

From June to September 1921, the rugby world waited expectantly as New Zealand and South Africa, two of the legendary teams in rugby history, met for the first time in a three-test series.

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31 May 2021

USA v South Africa, 1981: International Rugby on a Polo Field

Owl Creek Polo Field in Glenville, New York State, can lay claim to being the most unlikely international rugby ground of the last 150 years. On Friday 25 September 1981 it was the venue for the inaugural test match between the USA Eagles and the South African Springboks.

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18 May 2021

Remembering the 1996 Peace International

On the 18th May 1996 Lansdowne Road hosted a special fixture between Ireland and the Barbarians called the Peace International

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27 March 2021

27th March - A Red Letter Day for Rugby

On 27th March 1971, England and Scotland stepped out at Murrayfield for their second international test-match in the space of a week. The previous Saturday, both sides had completed their 5 Nations campaign at Twickenham, where Peter Brown's conversion had secured a 16-15 victory for Scotland.

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07 December 2020

Argentina's First Test Match

Earlier in the year, Eduardo García Sáenz provided a tour report of the British & Irish Lions 1910 tour of Argentina. Here he provides more detail, including local match reports, on Argentina’s first ever test-match on the same tour...

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21 September 2020

Internationals at Welford Road

The ground known as Welford Road, home of Leicester Tigers rugby club, hosted seven major rugby internationals in the 20th century. Physically located south of the city centre between Aylestone Road and Welford Road, the home of Leicester rugby since 1892 has played a huge part in the development and history of English rugby at club and international level.

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