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2008 Rugby League World Cup
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| 2008 Rugby League World Cup |
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| Details |
| Host Nation |
 Australia |
| Dates |
25 October - 22 November |
| Venues |
12 |
| Teams |
10 |
| Positions |
| Winner |
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| Runner-Up |
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| Statistics |
| Matches |
18 |
| Points |
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| Tries |
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| Attendances |
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| Players |
| Top Scorer |
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| Most Tries |
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| Best Player |
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The year 2008's Rugby League World Cup will be the 13th staging since the inauguration of the tournament in 1954, but the first since the 2000 event[1]. Scheduled to take place between 25 October and 22 November, it will be the fourth time that the tournament has been held in Australia, the first being in 1957. The tournament will feature the best ten teams across the globe who are split into three groups. A total of eighteen matches will take place in twelve different venues across four Australian states. The tournament will end a year of celebrations commemorating the centenary of the game in the southern hemisphere.
Five teams were granted automatic qualification, included reigning champions Australia, whilst another five qualified through various qualification tournaments, involving fourteen teams, which commenced in 2006[2]. There are no World Cup debutants, with Scotland and Ireland having made their debut in 2000. Samoa are the lowest ranked team to compete, coming 12th in the World Rankings.
The thirteenth Cup was originally scheduled to be held in Australia in 2004[3], however the lack of international success by the Great Britain and New Zealand after the 2000 World Cup, and the rise of the Tri-Nations tournament, meant that it was delayed for a further four years.[4] The Rugby League International Federation officially announced this tournament on 6 May 2006[5], with further details on scheduling and dates following on 19 April 2007[6].
The first match will take place in Townsville between England and Papua New Guinea, although the official opening ceremony of the competition will occur ahead of the Australia and New Zealand match the following day in Sydney[7]. The final will take place at Suncorp Stadium in Brisbane.
Teams
Format
Draw
The draw, after being confirmed by the RLIF on April 19, 2007, is made up of three groups. The first group will be made up of four teams, Australia, England, New Zealand and Papua New Guinea, whilst the other two groups will involve three teams each. The semi finals will be made up of the first three teams in the first group and the winner of a playoff between the winners of the second and third groups.
However, the draw had been put into doubt after the Papua New Guinea team claimed that the draw was unfair to them, and threatened to boycott the tournament should it not be changed. Marcus Bai, former Papua New Guinean winger and captain said[8]:
| “ |
They have to change it and if they don't, we won't come. We will ring up the other island nations and teams elsewhere who don't qualify and we can have our own competition. They have shown no respect for our country or for our efforts to promote the game up there. |
” |
Fortunately for the tournament, this separate island competition is not going to happen. Papua New Guinea are still angry with the draw but will now compete and will see it as a huge challenge, but one which will be rewarded if they win. The draw was finalised on October 4, 2007[9].
Points
Like all international Rugby League matches, teams will receive 2 points for a win, and 1 point for a draw. This means that unlike in the NRL, there will be no golden point rule enforced. In group stages, if two teams have the same number of points than position is determined on points difference, the amount of points scored minus the amount of points conceded.
Ranking Matches
After group matches have been completed, a match featuring the second placed teams in Group B and Group C will take place with the winner receiving 7th place. Similarly the third placed teams in Group B and Group C will play for 9th place. It is believed that these results will be taken into account in the 2009 RLIF World Rankings.
Qualification
Requirements
The Rugby League International Federation stipulated that each competing nation must meet the following criteria relating to domestic players:
- Each squad must contain a minimum of six players who have been registered in the relevant domestic competition for at least one year, or
- Each squad must contain at least six players who have played in that nation's junior international teams within the 18 months prior to the tournament.
If these criteria were not able to be met, then a nation could be thrown out of the competition. As well as these criteria, a nation wanting a place in the qualification rounds had to be an affiliate nation to the RLIF.
Tournaments
-
The five remaining places in the World Cup will be determined by qualification rounds. Two European rounds and Pacific, Atlantic and Repechage rounds were scheduled. Tonga and Fiji became the first two nations to qualify after Tonga defeated Samoa 18-10 in Leeds on 22 October. Samoa were forced to enter the repechage. In the European Group Two, Ireland drew 16-16 with Lebanon to ensure qualification, while Lebanon were forced to enter the repechage. The final automatic place went to Scotland, who defeated Wales 37-32 on aggregate after the two legs. Wales then faced Lebanon in the repechage semi-final, where they lost in a surprise 50-26 defeat, to knock them out of World Cup Qualifying. Lebanon then faced Samoa, who beat USA 42-10 in the first semi-final, on November 14th, for the final qualifying position. The game was won by Samoa, 38-16, and so they booked the tenth and final place. Many qualification matches were broadcast live by Sky Sports in the United Kingdom and New Zealand, whilst BigPondTV broadcasted matches online for other fans around the world[10].
Automatic Entry
The following teams were given automatic entry into the World Cup:
Other Matches
A commemorative match between the Australian Aborigines and New Zealand Māori teams will be held as part of opening ceremony festivities on October 26 at the Sydney Football Stadium, but will not form part of the competition.
During the 1995 and 2000 World Cups, an Emerging Nations tournament was run parallel to the competition. Nothing similar has been announced for this World Cup yet.
Venues
The final will be played at Suncorp Stadium, the home of the Brisbane Broncos, after the Queensland State Government outbid Sydney, where the final would have been held at ANZ Stadium.
| City |
State |
Stadium |
Host Club |
Map |
Capacity |
| Brisbane |
Queensland |
Suncorp Stadium |
Brisbane Broncos |
27°27′53″S 153°00′34″E / -27.464847, 153.009569 |
52,500 |
| Gold Coast |
Queensland |
Skilled Park |
Gold Coast Titans |
28°04′00″S 153°23′00″E / -28.066667, 153.383333 |
27,000 |
| Townsville |
Queensland |
Dairy Farmers Stadium |
North Queensland Cowboys |
27°27′53″S 153°00′34″E / -27.464847, 153.009569 |
25,000 |
| Penrith |
New South Wales |
CUA Stadium |
Penrith Panthers |
33°45′31″S 150°41′16″E / -33.758531, 150.687681 |
21,000 |
| Parramatta |
New South Wales |
Parramatta Stadium |
Parramatta Eels |
33°48′29″S 150°59′59″E / -33.808136, 150.999672 |
20,000 |
| Rockhampton |
Queensland |
Browne Park |
Central Comets |
27°27′53″S 153°00′34″E / -27.464847, 153.009569 |
8,000 |
| Sydney |
New South Wales |
Sydney Football Stadium |
Sydney Roosters |
33°53′21″S 151°13′31″E / -33.889128, 151.225392 |
45,500 |
| Melbourne |
Victoria |
Telstra Dome |
Melbourne Storm |
37°48′59″S 144°56′50″E / -37.816486, 144.947319 |
56,347 |
| Newcastle |
New South Wales |
EnergyAustralia Stadium |
Newcastle Knights |
32°55′09″S 151°43′38″E / -32.919033, 151.727239 |
26,126 |
| Canberra |
Australian Capital Territory |
Canberra Stadium |
Canberra Raiders |
35°15′00″S 149°06′10″E / -35.250031, 149.102644 |
25,011 |
| Wollongong |
New South Wales |
WIN Stadium |
St George Illawarra Dragons |
34°25′40″S 150°54′09″E / -34.427806, 150.9025 |
20,000 |
| Gosford |
New South Wales |
Bluetongue Stadium |
Central Coast Storm |
33°25′41″S 151°20′17″E / -33.428, 151.338 |
20,119 |
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Suncorp Stadium |
Telstra Dome |
Sydney Football Stadium |
Tickets
Tickets for Australian residents went on sale 7 November and internationally on 18 February [11]. However tickets were not distributed until 3 March. Ticketek were announced as the official ticketing agency for the competition, selling tickets for all matches[12]. Ticketmaster and Pilbeam Theatre are selling tickets to the Telstra Dome and Browne Park matches respectively.
On the 9 May it was announced that 25,000 tickets had been sold for the final in Brisbane[13].
Sponsorship
Broadcasting
Television
Channel 9 will broadcast all Group A matches and the Knockout Stage matches live across Australia. Fox Sports will broadcast all Group B and C matches plus Ranking Stage matches live. In the United Kingdom, Sky Sports will broadcast all matches live[14], because of this all will be shown in the morning, some as early as 06:00AM[15]. Sky Sports will also show all games live across New Zealand. Mai TV will broadcast all matches live in Papua New Guinea, Fiji, Samoa, Cook Islands and the Solomon Islands[16]. Orange Sport will provide coverage of all matches live in France.
Coverage of the competition will also extend to countries not taking part. Showtime will show all matches live across the Middle East. G will offer coverage of all games in many countries in Africa. Astro will show all matches in Malaysia and finally ESPN 360 will be showing all matches in the United States.
The only participating country with no television coverage of the matches is Tonga, however the RLIF are hoping to secure a deal before the World Cup starts.
BigPondTV, an online television station, will be broadcasting all matches live and will also repeat matches, this service is available to everyone for free.
Radio
Criticism
Due to the generally poor response of the 2000 World Cup, there were several key criticisms of the tournament before any matches had kicked off. The RLIF were forced to defend the credibility of the tournament in October 2007 after New Zealand, one of the favourites for the competition, were heavily beaten in a Test match 58-0 in Wellington against Australia[17]. Another criticism was whether there would be enough competitiveness throughout the ten teams, with some fans hoping they won't see too many one-sided matches[18], which was a common sight in the Group Stages of the 2000 tournament[19].
Group Stage
All teams from group A (shaded in green) with the exception of the bottom qualifying team will progress to the semi-finals, the other two groups the top finisher will progress to a playoff match, in which the winner will qualify to the semi-finals.
Group A
Group B
| Team |
Pld |
W |
D |
L |
PF |
PA |
PD |
Pts |
 Fiji |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
 France |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
 Scotland |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
Group C
| Team |
Pld |
W |
D |
L |
PF |
PA |
PD |
Pts |
 Ireland |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
 Samoa |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
 Tonga |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
Ranking Stage
7th Place Playoff
9th Place Playoff
Knockout Stage
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Qualifying Final |
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Semi-Final |
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Final |
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2nd Group A |
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3rd Group A |
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1st Group A |
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Winner Qualifying Final |
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1st Group B |
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1st Group C |
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Qualifying Final
Semi-Finals
Final
Sources
- "World Cup Moved To End of Season", BBC website, retrieved 4 May, 2006.
- "RLIF Meeting", Rugby League European Federation website, retrieved May 8, 2006
- "McDonald defends World Cup", BBC website, retrieved 6 May, 2006.
- "Lewis backs Australia for World Cup", telegraph.co.uk website, retrieved May 8, 2006
References
External links
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