The only collective combat sport to compete in static phases, touches, closed scrums or regroupings, rugby was born from an impertinence that has become its legend over time.
Favored by Thomas Arnold, principal of Rugby College (Warwickshire) in order to harden the character of the sons of the surrounding bourgeoisie and instill in them a sense of self-discipline, the game that they themselves imagined is only a huge fight involving several dozen students. Until the day when the young William Webb Ellis, with great contempt for the rules practiced at the time, grabbed the ball in his hand to rush towards the try line instead of immediately putting it back into the open scrum.
A very non-collective gesture which nevertheless made the fortune of the rule codified for students in 1846, since it was that of Rugby which was adopted by all the other English colleges, when the development of the railway made it possible to develop the practice in Great Britain then, following in the footsteps of local former students, throughout the British Empire but also in France and Japan.
Rugby, converted to professionalism in 1995, one hundred and ten years after football, took on a truly global scale with the creation of a World Cup in 1987.
Following in the footsteps of its first world stars, Jonah Lomu, Jonny Wilkinson and Dan Carter, it now has 132 nations affiliated with World Rugby and more than 8 million followers, in particular thanks to the growth of women's rugby.
Long renowned as a regional sport, it has crossed the borders of the South-West into France with the advent of an elite championship of 14 clubs which highlights a spectacular game while perpetuating its traditional values of courage, solidarity, respect for the refereeing authority on the field and conviviality in the stands.
