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France named 2023 WCup host
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France will host the Rugby World Cup in 2023, a year before the Olympic Games in Paris, after surprisingly beating South Africa and Ireland in a vote yesterday.
The World Rugby Council disregarded the recommendation of an evaluation report to hand the tenth edition of its showpiece tournament to South Africa.
A secret vote by member nations instead saw France, which hosted the 2007 World Cup, beat South Africa 24-15 in a second round.
Ireland, which has never hosted the World Cup on its own, was eliminated after the first round when it secured 8 of the 39 available votes to the 13 of South Africa and 18 of France.
The three bidding countries did not take part in the ballot. The remaining Six Nations and SANZAR countries had three votes each with the rest made up from the six regional associations and smaller rugby countries.
Bernard Laporte, head of the French union, had publicly complained about the evaluation report, saying it was “nonsense and full of errors” and accusing World Rugby of incompetence.
Speaking in London after the announcement, the former national team coach said: “It was a heavy challenge for us. We were late but I’m proud that we’ve been chosen.”
“If you look there wasn’t a great deal between France and South Africa in the evaluation report,” World Rugby president Bill Beaumont said. “It was very close.”
It means France will host four prestigious sporting events within six years, with golf’s Ryder Cup in Paris next year and soccer’s Women’s World Cup across France in 2019.
The French sports ministry said the decision to award it the Rugby World Cup so close to the Olympics and Paralympics in Paris in 2024 “demonstrates the excellence of the French know-how in organizing major sporting events”.
The Rugby World Cup final is set to be played at the Stade de France in Saint-Denis, just outside Paris.
South Africa, which staged the Rugby World Cup in 1995, has now failed with four successive bids to land the tournament again.
Fans gathered in the capital Pretoria expecting to celebrate victory in the vote. Instead, some of the crowd, dressed in the colors of the South African flag, were in tears as they watched the announcement from England.
“Why has it gone against the recommendation when most of the unions said they would vote with the recommendation?” Joel Stransky, who kicked the dropped goal that won the 1995 final for South Africa against New Zealand, said on SuperSport television. “What is the point of having an independent auditor if you’re not even going to take heed of their recommendation?”
Japan will host the next World Cup, in 2019.
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