Rugby union (rugby) in Australia has a history of organised competition dating back to the early 1870s in Sydney with the first clubs Sydney University FC and Wallaroo FC. The New South Wales Rugby Union was founded in 1874, modeled on England's Rugby Football Union. Although traditionally most popular in Australia's rugby football strongholds of New South Wales, Queensland and the ACT, the sport is played throughout the nation.
The principal provincial competition in Australian rugby is Super Rugby, which is a multi-national competition across the South Pacific. Australia enters four teams: the Reds of Queensland, the Waratahs of New South Wales, the Brumbies of the Australian Capital Territory and the Western Force of Western Australia.
Currently there is no nationwide domestic club competition for rugby union in Australia following the disbandment of the National Rugby Championship in 2020. Competitions below the level of Super Rugby are traditional capital city competitions, such as the Shute Shield of Sydney, Queensland Premier Rugby of Brisbane, the ACTRU Premier Division in Canberra, and Perth's RugbyWA Premier Grade. These city-based club competitions have traditionally formed the highest level of domestic competition for the sport in Australia.
The national governing body of Rugby Australia launched a new top-level women's 15s competition known as Super W in 2018 featuring five clubs branded as state/territorial teams—the ACT, New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria and Western Australia.
The men's national team are the Wallabies, who have won the Rugby World Cup twice, in 1991 and in 1999. The women's national team are the Wallaroos achieving a best result of third place in 2010 during the Women's Rugby World Cup.
Rugby union holds the match attendance record of any football code in New South Wales (109,874), Western Australia (61,241) and the Australian Capital Territory (28,753).
Australia has also achieved success in numerous Rugby Sevens tournaments with the women's sevens team winning the Rugby World Cup Sevens once in 2009, winning gold at the 2016 Olympics, and winning the World Rugby Women's Sevens Series three times. While the men's sevens team has been runners-up twice in the Rugby World Cup Sevens.
History
19th century
Accounts of rugby being played in the Colony of New South Wales date back to the 1840s. Some settlers would have been familiar with earlier forms of the game even before it was formally codified at Rugby School in 1845.In Van Diemen's Land (Tasmania) rugby was being played at Christ College in Bishopsbourne in the late 1840s.
Rugby arrived in the Colony of Victoria as early as the mid-1850s. Tom Wills, co-founder of Australian rules football, attended Rugby School and attempted to introduce the school's game into Melbourne schools in 1858 before settling on a compromise of rules. Variations of rugby were played by clubs in Melbourne, including the South Yarra FC as early as 1858. In 1860 J. B. Thompson published the Rugby Rules (along with the Victorian and Eton Rules) in the widely distributed Victorian Cricketer's Guide.
In Sydney football of unknown rules had been played over the last half of the 1860s by students at Sydney University, short-lived clubs and military sides. Players familiar with the rugby game from the Sydney schools, along with increased arrivals from England and elsewhere, soon led to organised club rugby football commencing in Sydney after the formation of the Wallaroo FC in 1870. The club's first rules famously included at Rule XXIII a provision which prohibited the "throttling or strangling" of opponents. The first recorded game played under rugby rules was held in Sydney on 18 June 1870 between Wallaroo FC and a British 'Army & Navy' team.On 23 June 1871 a meeting was held at the Metropolitan Hotel to formally establish the Sydney University FC who today are Australia's oldest rugby union club.
In 1874 the Wallaroo FC led the formation of a body to oversee agreed rugby rules for the clubs called the Southern Rugby Football Union (now the NSWRU). The other clubs present with Wallaroo at the founding meeting were Goulburn, Waratah, Balmain, St. Leonards, The King’s School, Camden College and Newington College. This was the first such governing body formed anywhere in the world after England and Scotland. In the oldest remaining rivalry game in Australian rugby union, The King's School and Newington still play each other annually via the AAGPS (NSW) Rugby competition.
The first intercolonial football match in Australia under any code occurred on 23 June 1877 resultant of the 'Waratah' FC inviting Australian rules football club, the Carlton Football Club, to Sydney to play two matches, one under rugby rules and one under Australian rules. On Saturday 23 June 1877, 3,000 spectators watched Waratah beat Carlton at rugby at the Albert Cricket Ground in Redfern. In the return leg, Carlton defeated Waratah under Australian rules. The two clubs met again in 1878 in Melbourne.
In 1877 the Sydney University FC unsuccessfully attempted to have the Southern Rugby Football Union and its members clubs swap codes to Australian rules football.The initiative fueled interest in the rival code, culminating in 1880 in the formation of New South Wales Football Association (now AFL) and clubs in Sydney. Prominent southern Melbourne football clubs including Albert Park and South Melbourne strongly advocated for rugby rules throughout the 1860s and 1870s,The Record and Emerald Hill and Sandridge Advertiser. May 1874 however this did not meet favour with the more powerful clubs in the colony.
The earliest record of rugby games and formation of rugby clubs in the Colony of Queensland was in Brisbane in 1876.The first of annual inter-colonial rugby games between NSW (now Waratahs) and Queensland (now Reds) occurred on 12 August 1882, when rugby players from the four Queensland Football Association (now AFL) clubs travelled to Sydney. NSW won by 28 points to 4 at the Association Ground (later to be renamed the Sydney Cricket Ground) in front of 4,000 spectators. Later that same year, the Southern Rugby Union undertook its inaugural tour of New Zealand, winning four of its seven matches.
On 2 November, in 1883, the Northern Rugby Union (now QRU) was formed as the rugby body in Queensland after a meeting at the Exchange Hotel. As a result of the formation of the new body, several prominent grammar schools took up rugby as opposed to Melbourne Rules. The following year, a New Zealand party went to Australia and the first club competition was held in Queensland. In 1888 the Melbourne Rugby Union was formed in Victoria. That year the first British and Irish Lions tour was carried out. Although unsanctioned by official bodies in Europe, the 21-man squad went to both Australia and New Zealand. In 1892, the rugby bodies in Australia dropped Southern and Northern from their titles, adopting New South Wales and Queensland respectively.
In 1893, Frank Ivory was the first Indigenous Australian to play representative rugby union when he was chosen for Queensland.
In 1899, the national team of Australia (now Wallabies) played their first match, and the Hospital's Cup became an annual competition in Queensland.
1900s to 1940s
Australia played its first test against New Zealand in 1903 in front of a crowd of 30,000 at the Sydney Cricket Ground. In 1907, Australia again played New Zealand, at the same venue as the 1903 match, with crowd numbers reaching 50,000. This figure would not be surpassed again in Australian rugby union until after the game turned professional.
The British Isles team visited Australia in 1904 and 1908, and at the 1908 Summer Olympics, the Australian team defeated England to win the gold medal in rugby. That same year, the New South Wales Rugby League broke away from the NSWRU, with the Queensland Rugby League following suit from the QRU in 1909.
An event that was to greatly shape rugby union's future in Australia was the onset of World War I in 1914. Rugby competitions were suspended due to an overwhelmingly high percentage of rugby players enlisting to serve in the Australian Imperial Force.
The enlistment of rugby players was so quick and extensive that, by 1915, a Sydney newspaper reported: "According to figures prepared by Mr W. W. Hill, secretary of the New South Wales Rugby Union, 197 out of 220 regular first grade players are on active service, or 90 percent."
Weakened by the loss of its players to the war effort, the Queensland Rugby Union was dissolved in 1919. It was not until 1928 that the union was re-formed and the Brisbane clubs and Great Public Schools returned to playing the rugby union code.
In 1931, Charles Bathurst, 1st Viscount Bledisloe, as Governor of New Zealand, donated a sporting trophy called the Bledisloe Cup for competition between Australia and New Zealand. The first game was held that year at Eden Park, though the official start of the competition is disputed between that game and the 1932 New Zealand tour to Australia.
Until the late 1940s, the administration of the Australian team, including all tours, was handled by New South Wales, being the senior union. A national body, the Australian Rugby Football Union was formed at a conference in Sydney in 1945, acting initially in an advisory capacity only, and in 1949 was formally constituted and joined the International Rugby Football Board (IRFB), representing Australia.
Apparently Australian rugby union then existed in a state of suspended animation until the 1980s.
1980s to present In 1987, the first ever Rugby World Cup was held in both Australia and New Zealand, as a result of both the respective rugby bodies putting forth the idea to the IRB. Australia was defeated by France in the semifinal stage.
The 1991 Rugby World Cup took place in Europe, and saw Australia defeat England 12-6 in the Final, winning their first World Cup after having triumphed over their fierce rivals New Zealand in the semifinal.
With rugby union becoming an openly professional sport in 1995, after more than a century of a professed amateur status, major changes were seen in both the club and international game. The Super 12 rugby competition was born that year. The tournament involved 12 provincial sides from three countries; New Zealand, South Africa and Australia. Australia entered three sides into the competition; ACT Brumbies, Queensland Reds and the New South Wales Waratahs. The year also saw the first Tri Nations Series, between the three Super 12 countries.
In 1999, the Bledisloe Cup match between Australia and New Zealand was staged at the Homebush Olympic Stadium, now known as ANZ Stadium. The game attracted a then world record crowd for a rugby union match of 107,042 to see Australia win with its greatest margin over New Zealand by 28–7. In 2000 this record was raised again when a crowd of 109,874 witnessed the 'Greatest ever Rugby Match'. New Zealand took an early lead of 24-nil after 11 minutes only to see Australia draw level at 24 all by half time, and the match was decided by a Jonah Lomu try to finish in favour of New Zealand by 39–35.
The Wallabies were champions of the 1999 Rugby World Cup in Wales, claiming their second Webb Ellis Cup trophy. In doing this, Australia became the first team to win multiple world cups.