2019–20 World Rugby Sevens Series

The 2019–20 World Rugby Sevens Series was the 21st annual series of rugby sevens tournaments for national men's rugby sevens teams. The Sevens Series has been run by World Rugby since 1999–2000.

In March 2020, World Rugby postponed all remaining tournaments in the series due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The events in London and Paris were postponed provisionally until September, preceding the Singapore and Hong Kong events previously postponed until October. On 30 June, the remaining four rounds of the series was cancelled which meant that New Zealand was awarded the title by 11 points over second-placed South Africa.

Format Sixteen nations competed at each event, drawn into four pools of four teams each. Following the pool matches at each tournament, the top eight teams (two teams from each pool) played off for a Cup, with gold, silver and bronze medals also awarded to the first three teams. The bottom eight teams after the pool matches played off for the lower-ranked placings from ninth to sixteenth at each tournament. The winner of the series was determined by the overall points standings gained across all events in the season.

Challenger Series and the COVID-19 pandemic

World Rugby announced in December 2019 that there would be a feeder competition to the Sevens Series consisting of sixteen teams that would play two sevens events in South America, determining the final eight teams to play in a playoff-style event at the Hong Kong Sevens. The final winner would be promoted to the World Rugby Sevens Series and replace the invitational side in the Sevens Series.

As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, World Rugby postponed the Sevens Series and Challenger Series seasons to be completed at a later date in the year before subsequently cancelling the season entirely. Because of both competitions seasons being cancelled, the final playoff in Hong Kong to decide the team who would be promoted to the Sevens Series would not be decided and the team with the highest points tally would be the promoted team. Japan, an invited team to five of the six Sevens Series events was promoted having accumulated thirty-nine points in total, three points clear at the top of the table.

Core teams The fifteen "core teams" qualified to participate in all series events for 2019–20 were:

Ireland joined as a core team for the first time after winning the 2019–20 World Series qualifier held in Hong Kong. They replaced Japan who were relegated after finishing as the lowest-placed core team in 2018–19. However, Japan will play in several tournaments as the wild card team in preparation to host the Olympic tournament.

Tour venues The official schedule for the 2019–20 World Rugby Sevens Series was:

+ 2019–20 Itinerary Leg Stadium City Dates Winner Dubai The Sevens Dubai 5–7 December 2019 South Africa Cape Town Stadium Cape Town 13–15 December 2019 New Zealand FMG Stadium Waikato Hamilton 25–26 January 2020 Australia Bankwest Stadium Sydney 1–2 February 2020 United States Dignity Health Sports Park Los Angeles 29 February – 1 March 2020 Canada BC Place Vancouver 7–8 March 2020 Hong Kong Hong Kong Stadium Hong Kong 3–5 April 2020 Cancelled Singapore National Stadium Singapore 11–12 April 2020 Cancelled London Twickenham Stadium London 23–24 May 2020 Cancelled Paris Stade Jean-Bouin Paris 30–31 May 2020 Cancelled

Events in Singapore and Hong Kong were originally scheduled to be played in April 2020 but were postponed due to health concerns relating to the COVID-19 pandemic and rescheduled to October 2020. In June 2020, World Rugby cancelled all four remaining rounds of the tournament (Singapore, Hong Kong, England and France) due to the pandemic.

Standings

The final standings after completion of the six tournaments of the series are shown in the table below.

The points awarded to teams at each tournament, as well as the overall season totals, are shown. Gold indicates the event champions. Silver indicates the event runner-ups. Bronze indicates the event third place finishers. A dash (–) is recorded in the event column if a team did not compete at a tournament.

Official standings for the 2019–20 series: + 2019–20 World Rugby Sevens – Series XXI Pos. Dubai Hamilton Sydney Los Angeles Vancouver Pointstotal 1 19 2222 13 17 22 115 2 2219 7 19 2215 104 3 8 15 8 2219 11 83 4 13 5 17 12 15 19 81 5 17 7 15 15 10 1377 6 12 17 19 8 11 774 7 10 8 12 17 13 12 72 8 7 6 13 7 7 1757 9 11 13 11 10 8 3 56 10 5 12 5 11 12 4 49 11 3 10 6 6 4 837 12 4 11 10 1 3 6 35 13 15 4 2 2 5 5 33 14 6 3 4 4 6 10 33 15 2 1 1 5 2 2 1316 1 2 3 3 –1 1017 – – – – 1 – 1

Source: World Rugby

{| class="wikitable" style="font-size:92%;" |- !colspan=2| Legend |- style="line-height:18px; font-size:90%;" |colspan=2 align=center |Event Medalists |- |bgcolor=#FFD700|Gold |Event Champions |- |bgcolor=#C0C0C0|Silver |Event Runner-ups |- |bgcolor=#CD7F32|Bronze |Event Third place finishers |- |- style="line-height:18px; font-size:90%;" |colspan=2 align=center |Qualification for the 2020–21 World Rugby Sevens Series |- |No colour |Core team in 2019–20 and re-qualified as a core team for the 2020–21 World Rugby Sevens Series |- |style="background:#ffc;"|Yellow |Invited team

Note:

Players

Scoring leaders

+Tries scored Rank Player Tries 1 Jordan Conroy 30 2 Carlin Isles 22 3 Aminiasi Tuimaba 20 4 Perry Baker 19 5 Terry Kennedy 17

+Points scored Rank Player Points 1 Napolioni Bolaca 159 2 Jordan Conroy 150 3 Nathan Hirayama 141 4 Lewis Holland 125 5 Waisea Nacuqu 124

Updated: 11 March 2020

Tournaments

Dubai

EventWinnerScoreFinalistCup15–0Bronze19–175th PlaceTournament Points Difference 60–217th PlaceTournament Points Difference 20–(-18)9th Place40–1711th Place19–1413th Place29–2415th Place38–12

Cape Town

EventWinnerScoreFinalistCup7–5Bronze29–24 (a.e.t.)5th PlaceTournament Points Difference 43–07th PlaceTournament Points Difference (-2)–(-16)9th Place17–1211th Place22–513th Place38–715th Place19–15

Hamilton

EventWinnerScoreFinalistCup27–5Bronze33–215th Place28–77th Place19–179th Place12–511th Place24–1913th Place19–1515th Place21–7

Sydney

EventWinnerScoreFinalistCup27–5Bronze33–215th Place28–77th Place19–179th Place12–511th Place24–1913th Place19–1515th Place21–7

Los Angeles

EventWinnerScoreFinalistCup29–24 (a.e.t.)Bronze21–195th Place24–197th PlaceTournament Points Difference (-20)–(-44)9th Place21–1911th PlaceTournament Points Difference 2–(-30)13th Place29–24 (a.e.t.)15th PlaceTournament Points Difference (-92)–(-149)

Vancouver

EventWinnerScoreFinalistCup17–14Bronze26–195th Place26–247th PlaceTournament Points Difference (-27)–(-56)9th Place7–1211th PlaceTournament Points Difference (-11)–(-30)13th Place31–26 (a.e.t.)15th PlaceTournament Points Difference (-79)–(-81)

2019–20 World Rugby Sevens Series

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