2021 Women's Rugby League World Cup

The 2021 Women's Rugby League World Cup will be the sixth staging of the Women's Rugby League World Cup, to be held in England from 15 October to 19 November 2022.[1] Originally planned for 2021, it was delayed a year along with the Men's and Wheelchair tournaments due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The tournament will feature eight teams, an increase of two from the previous tournament.

This article is about the women's tournament. For the men's tournament, see 2021 Rugby League World Cup.
2021 (2021) Women's Rugby League World Cup  ()
Number of teams8
Host country England
Matches played15
Tournaments
 < 2017
2025 > 

For the first time the tournament will have parity with the Men's and Wheelchair tournaments with all participants being paid the same while all 61 matches across three tournaments will be broadcast live.[2][3]

Teams

The competing teams were selected based on a number of criteria including growth and current infrastructure and were announced on 18 July 2019.[4]

Region Team Previous
appearances		 Previous best result World
ranking
Americas  Brazil 0 Debut 11
 Canada 1 Semi-finals (2017) 4
Asia-Pacific  Australia 5 Champions (2013, 2017) 1
 Cook Islands 2 Pool stage (2003, 2017) 5
 New Zealand 5 Champions (2000, 2003, 2008) 2
 Papua New Guinea 1 Pool stage (2017) 6
Europe  England[lower-alpha 1] 3 Semi-finals (2008, 2017), 3rd of 4 (2013) 3
 France 2 Pool stage (2008, 2013) 7
  1. Competed as part of  Great Britain in 2 previous tournaments, finishing as runners-up in 2000.

Venues

The list of venues for both the women's and the men's tournaments were announced in January 2019. The full schedule of games to be played at each venue will not be announced until after the draw for the competition in November 2019 but venues that were announced as definitely hosting one or more games of the tournament are:[5]

Manchester Liverpool
Old Trafford[lower-alpha 1] Anfield[lower-alpha 2]
Capacity: 74,994 Capacity: 54,074
Leeds York
Headingley Stadium York Community Stadium
Capacity: 21,062 Capacity: 8,500
Hull
MKM Stadium
Capacity: 25,586

Team base camps

Base camps were used by the eight national squads to stay and train before and during the World Cup tournament. On 10 June 2020, these locations were released. The teams will be based in Leeds and York[6]

  • Leeds: Brazil, Canada, England and Papua New Guinea
  • York: Australia, Cook Islands, France and New Zealand

Draw

The teams were drawn into two groups of four. The two seeded teams were England (Group A) as hosts and Australia as holders (Group B). The draw was made at Buckingham Palace on 16 January 2020. Teams from pool 1 were drawn by Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex, pool 2 was drawn by Katherine Grainger and pool 3 by Jason Robinson.[7]

Pool Group A Group B
Seeded England Australia
Pool 1 Papua New Guinea New Zealand
Pool 2 Canada France
Pool 3 Brazil Cook Islands

Fixtures

Ahead of the fixture list being announced, the organisers stated that there will be at least four days between a team's games in the interests of player welfare.[8]

The fixtures were announced on 21 July 2020.[9] Following the postponement of the tournament from 2021 to 2022, a revised schedule was published on 21 November 2021.[10] All the games in the tournament will be played as double headers with other games from either the women's or men's tournaments.[11]

Group A
Pos Team Pld W D L PF PA PD Pts Qualification
1 England 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Advance to knockout stages
2 Papua New Guinea 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
3 Canada 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
4 Brazil 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
First match(es) will be played on 1 November 2022. Source:

Round 1

1 November 2022
14:30 GMT (UTC±00:00)
England  v  Brazil

Round 2

5 November 2022
12:00 GMT (UTC±00:00)
England  v  Canada

5 November 2022
17:00 GMT (UTC±00:00)
Papua New Guinea  v  Brazil

Round 3

9 November 2022
17:00 GMT (UTC±00:00)
Canada  v  Brazil

Group B
Pos Team Pld W D L PF PA PD Pts Qualification
1 Australia 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Advance to knockout stages
2 New Zealand 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
3 France 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
4 Cook Islands 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
First match(es) will be played on 2 November 2022. Source:

All six of the Group B fixtures will be played at the York Community Stadium in York.

Round 1

Round 2

6 November 2022
19:30 GMT (UTC±00:00)
Australia  v  France

Round 3

10 November 2022
17:00 GMT (UTC±00:00)
France  v  Cook Islands

Semi-finals

The semi-finals will be played as a double header at the York Community Stadium, York on 22 November 2021.

First semi-final
14 November 2022
17:00 GMT (UTC±00:00)
Group B winner v Group A runner-up

Second semi-final
14 November 2022
19:30 GMT (UTC±00:00)
Group A winner v Group B winner

Final

The final will be played at Old Trafford, Manchester on 27 November 2021 as a double header with the final of the men's tournament.

Final
19 November 2022
13:15 GMT (UTC±00:00)
First semi-final winner v Second semi-final winner

See also

Legacy of the 2021 Rugby League World Cup

Notes
  1. Venue of the final in double header with the Men's final
  2. Venue of opening ceremony and match

References
  1. "WRLWC Schedule". rlwc2021.com.
  2. Darbyshire, Drew (21 October 2019). "Women and wheelchair players to receive equal pay to men at 2021 World Cup". Love Rugby League. Retrieved 2 May 2021.
  3. Ed, Dixon (2 July 2020). "2021 Rugby League World Cup and IRL team up on broadcast production - SportsPro Media". www.sportspromedia.com. Retrieved 2 May 2021.
  4. "Nations confirmed for Women's Rugby League World Cup 2021". RLIF. 18 July 2019. Retrieved 23 July 2019.
  5. "Full list of host venues revealed". Stadia Magazine. 30 January 2019. Retrieved 16 October 2019.
  6. "Kangaroos to be united in Manchester: World Cup team bases announced". National Rugby League. 10 June 2020. Retrieved 10 June 2020.
  7. "Rugby League World Cup 2021 draw: England drawn with Samoa, France and Greece". BBC Sport. 16 January 2020. Retrieved 16 January 2020.
  8. "World Cup format revised to give women longer break between fixtures". RL News. 28 October 2019. Retrieved 28 October 2019.
  9. "England start against Samoa at World Cup". BBC Sport. 21 July 2020. Retrieved 22 July 2020.
  10. Gordon, James (19 November 2021). "List of Rugby League World Cup 2021 fixtures - date-by-date by tournament". LoveRugbyLeague. Retrieved 10 February 2022.
  11. "Rugby League World Cup 2021 | Schedule". www.rlwc2021.com. 21 July 2020. Retrieved 22 July 2020.
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