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2021 (2021) Rugby League World Cup  ()
Number of teams	16 (men) 8 (women) 8 (wheelchair)
Host country	England
Matches played	31 (men) 15 (women) 15 (wheelchair)
< 2017 2025 >

The 2021 Rugby League World Cup is a collection of world cups in the sport of rugby league being held in England from 15 October 2022 to 19 November 2022. International Rugby League announced that England had won hosting rights for the competition on 27 October 2016. The English RFL received £25 million UK government support for the tournaments to be held in the country and saw off a United States–Canada bid from an Australian sports–marketing agency. Organisers partnered with the UK Cabinet Office as part of a commitment to the Northern Powerhouse, with 87 percent of all matches to be held in northern towns and cities.

Despite the COVID–19 pandemic, organisers had initially planned for the tournaments to go ahead between 23 October 2021 and 27 November 2021. However, withdrawals from Australia and New Zealand over "player welfare and safety concerns" caused the tournaments to be postponed – with the event's chief executive admitting that a World Cup without those teams would have lacked credibility.

For the first time, the men's, women's, and wheelchair tournaments will be held concurrently as centrepiece events with all participants being paid the same. 32 teams (16 men, 8 women, and 8 wheelchair) are competing in the tournaments across 61 matches. Additional competitions under the Festival of World Cups banner were also planned to take place but were cancelled due to fundraising and squad selection issues caused by the COVID–19 pandemic. Despite its cancellation, events for Masters Rugby League and an inaugural Physical Disability Rugby League World Cup were rescheduled to take place alongside the main competitions. All 61 matches in the men's, women's, and wheelchair competitions were broadcast live, with the opening and closing matchdays of the physical disability competition also receiving UK coverage via BBC Sport.

Along with official sponsers and partners, organisers announced numerous projects to focus on the long-term impact of the Rugby League World Cup. Named "InspirationALL", this included a £10 million fund from the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport to enable sports clubs to develop their facilities.

Host selection

There were initially three bids for the 2021 Rugby League World Cup but the United Arab Emirates' bid was cancelled due to the arrest of Sol Mokdad at the behest of UAE rugby union officials.

England, and the United States and Canada were the two remaining bidders of the event. The English RFL received UK government support - £15 million to enhance the tournament and up to a further £10 million into the game's infrastructure - for the event to be staged in the country. The RFL mentioned they wanted the event to be the most attended in history with over 1,000,000 people attending the grounds over the tournament's days. They were also planning to use 12 venues for the event which included non-purpose and rugby league-purpose stadiums.

The United States and Canada bid was initially a sole United States bid from an Australian sports–marketing agency, Moore Sports International (MSI). Eight to ten cities, featuring venues from either the NFL or MLS, were planned for the event, offering Rugby League International Federation the opportunity to stage the tournament outside of Europe and Australasia for the first time. Canada Rugby League later announced they wanted to be a part of the United States bid stating that the cities of Vancouver and Toronto could also potentially host matches.

On 27 October 2016, the RLIF announced that England had won hosting rights for the 2021 Rugby League World Cup.

Venues

The full list of 21 venues to be used for the three tournaments (men's, women's and wheelchair) was announced on 29 January 2019. Seventeen venues will be used for the men's tournament and in addition Preston and York were announced as a training venue for the tournaments. Four of those same venues (DW Stadium, Headingley Stadium, MKM Stadium, and Old Trafford) as well as the York Community Stadium will be used for the women's tournament. Three further venues (Copper Box Arena, English Institute of Sport, and Manchester Central) will host the Wheelchair tournament. Base camps are to be used by the 32 national squads to stay and train before and during the World Cup tournament. On 10 June 2020, these locations were released. All three tournaments will hold their final in Manchester on 19 November.

Organisers partnered with the UK Cabinet Office as part of a commitment to the Northern Powerhouse. The UK's Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government and the Northern Powerhouse minister welcomed the news that 87 percent of matches (including all three finals) would be held in the North, exceeding a previous 80 percent commitment from organisers in receipt of £25 million government funding. This attracted some criticism from Rugby League expansionists unhappy about the lack of games throughout the country outside of the traditional M62 Corridor.

The use of the as-yet unbuilt Workington Community Stadium was initially a venue for three group matches in the men's tournament but was later cancelled. The venue was first thrown into doubt after the 2019 Allerdale Borough Council election when control of the council changed and the new council showed less enthusiasm for the new stadium project. In early July 2019, Allerdale Council confirmed that they would be unable to host any matches in the tournament. On 28 August 2019, it was announced that Kingston Park in Newcastle upon Tyne would host the three games originally allocated to Workington. Anfield in Liverpool were also due to host matches in both the men's and women's tournaments but became unavailable when the competition was moved from 2021 to 2022. It was replaced by the DW Stadium in Wigan.

The BBC's official trailer for the tournaments depicted landmarks from some of the host towns and cities. In chronological order these were; the Tyne Bridge (Newcastle), Sports Village (Leigh), Tower Bridge and its surroundings (London), the Corn Exchange (Leeds), the M62 motorway (in reference to the M62 Corridor), and Beetham Tower and its surroundings (Manchester).

Stadium locations

Stadiums are referred to by their official name rather than sponsored name, as is International Rugby League policy.

Manchester (Old Trafford)	London (Holloway)	Newcastle (city centre)	Leeds (Beeston)	Middlesbrough
Old Trafford	Emirates Stadium	St James' Park	Elland Road	Riverside Stadium
Capacity: 74,994	Capacity: 60,260	Capacity: 52,405	Capacity: 37,890	Capacity: 34,742
Sheffield (Highfield)	NewcastleNewcastleLondonMiddlesbroughCoventryHullYorkSt HelensWarringtonLondonGreater ManchesterWest YorkshireSouth Yorkshire LeighBoltonOld TraffordWiganManchesterclass=notpageimage| Stadiums in Greater Manchester LeedsHeadingleyHuddersfieldclass=notpageimage| Stadiums in West Yorkshire SheffieldSheffieldDoncasterclass=notpageimage| Stadiums in South Yorkshire			Hull
Bramall Lane				MKM Stadium
Capacity: 32,702				Capacity: 25,400
Coventry				Bolton
Coventry Building Society Arena				University of Bolton Stadium
Capacity: 32,753				Capacity: 28,723
Wigan				Huddersfield
DW Stadium				Kirklees Stadium
Capacity: 25,138				Capacity: 24,121
Leeds (Headingley)				St Helens
Headingley Rugby Stadium				Totally Wicked Stadium
Capacity: 21,062				Capacity: 18,000
Doncaster	Warrington	Leigh	Newcastle (Kingston Park)	York
Eco-Power Stadium	Halliwell Jones Stadium	Leigh Sports Village	Kingston Park	York Community Stadium
Capacity: 15,231	Capacity: 15,200	Capacity: 12,000	Capacity: 10,200	Capacity: 8,500
Manchester (city centre)		London (Olympic Park)	Sheffield (Lower Don Valley)
Manchester Central		Copper Box Arena	English Institute of Sport
Capacity: 10,900		Capacity: 7,481	Capacity: Changeable

Team base camp locations

14 base camps are to be used by the 32 national teams to stay and train before and during the World Cup tournament, as follows:

• Bolton – France (Men’s)
• Doncaster – Samoa (Men’s)
• Hull – Fiji (Men’s)
• Leeds – Jamaica, Ireland (Men’s) | England, Papua New Guinea, Brazil, Canada (Women’s)
• London – England, Australia, Norway, Spain (Wheelchair)
• Merseyside – Tonga, Italy (Men’s)
• Manchester – England, Australia (Men’s)
• Newcaste – Scotland (Men’s)
• Preston – Wales (Men’s)
• Sheffield – Greece (Men’s) | France, Wales, Scotland, USA (Wheelchair)
• Tees Valley – Cook Islands (Men’s)
• Warrington – Papua New Guinea (Men’s)
• Wigan – Lebanon (Men’s)
• York – New Zealand (Men’s) | Australia, New Zealand, France, Cook Islands (Women’s)

Postponement due to the COVID-19 Pandemic

The World Cups were originally due to be held between 23 October 2021 and 27 November 2021, but the COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent withdrawals of Australia and New Zealand caused the tournament to be postponed.

Despite the initial date for World Cup being over a year and a half away when Covid-19 was declared a pandemic, from very early on organisers devoloped contingency plans to defer the events to 2022 should it become necessary to postpone in 2021. Having originally given themselves a cut off date of May 2021, organisers finally announced in July their decision to go ahead with the planned scheduling for 2021. This was despite reports that the Australian Rugby League Commission had yet to sign the participation agreement and the South Sydney Rabbitohs CEO Blake Solly claiming the preferred option from NRL clubs remained to postpone it to 2022. RLWC2021 chief executive Jon Dutton told BBC Radio 5 live that the option to postpone was discussed but was ""significantly unpalatable" with the potential of clashing with the men's football World Cup, the women's football European Championships and the Commonwealth Games in 2022. Dutton also suggested that there would be "a number of nations who would step up if any nation didn't take part for any reason across all three tournaments". Just one week later, Australia and New Zealand officially declared their withdrawal from the competitions citing "player welfare and safety concerns".

In the one week between tournament organisers annoucing the tournament would go ahead in 2021 and the announcement that Australia and New Zealand would withdraw, the United Kingdom had repealed its last remaining social contact restrictions on so called "Freedom Day" despite skyrocketing Covid-19 cases. In contrast, during that same period, half of Australia's population were placed back under lockdown and 14 NRL clubs were relocated to Queensland in order for the remainder of 2021 NRL season to be completed.

Australia and New Zealand faced backlash following their announcement to withdraw with RFL chairman Simon Johnson calling the decision "selfish, parochial and cowardly". The Guardian had previously claimed that NRL clubs were not keen on the World Cup's current scheduling because players may not return until two weeks before the start of trial games for the 2022 NRL season (and border rules dictated anyone returning to the country must spend 14 days in government-managed quarantine). Johnson also suggested that the decision had been made at boardroom-level and without the consultation of players whilst The Guardian further claimed that a survey showed 75% of players consulted by Australia’s players union remained happy to travel to England. Johnson had also pointed out the difference compared to other Australian sporting bodies that were still planning to send athletes to the Tokyo Olympics from July 2021. However, former Downing Street Press Secretary and British journalist Alastair Campbell noted the differences between the lower cases and tougher restrictions in Japan compared to the higher cases and no restrictions that existed in the UK – instead blaming Simon Johnson's namesake and then-British PM Boris Johnson for wrecking the World Cup.

On 5 August 2021 tournament organisers announced they would postpone the World Cups to 2022 with just little more than a month away from its start with Dutton admitting that a World Cup without Australia and New Zealand would have lacked credibility.

Competitions

For the first time, the men's, women's, and wheelchair tournaments will be held concurrently as centrepiece events with all players receiving equal pay. The draw for all the World Cup tournaments were originally scheduled to be finalised on 27 November 2019, exactly two years before the original date of the tournament final, but it was postponed until 16 January 2020. The draw was made at Buckingham Palace on 16 January 2020. For each competition 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.

Men’s tournament

The 2021 Men's Rugby League World Cup is the sixteenth staging of Men's Rugby League World Cup. 16 teams are competing in the tournament, an increase of two from the previous two tournaments and the first to feature 16 teams since the 2000 Rugby League World Cup. Australia are defending champions having won a record eleventh title last time out. Competing countries were divided into four groups of four teams (groups A to D). Teams in each group played one another in a round-robin, with the top two teams advancing to the knockout stage.

Group A

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	PF	PA	PD	Pts	Qualification
1	England (H)	3	3	0	0	196	28	+168	6	Advance to knockout stage
2	Samoa	3	2	0	1	140	68	+72	4
3	France	3	1	0	2	56	116	−60	2
4	Greece	3	0	0	3	20	200	−180	0

Group B

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	PF	PA	PD	Pts	Qualification
1	Australia	3	3	0	0	192	14	+178	6	Advance to knockout stage
2	Fiji	3	2	0	1	98	60	+38	4
3	Italy	3	1	0	2	38	130	−92	2
4	Scotland	3	0	0	3	18	142	−124	0

Group C

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	PF	PA	PD	Pts	Qualification
1	New Zealand	3	3	0	0	150	28	+122	6	Advance to knockout stage
2	Lebanon	3	2	0	1	118	60	+58	4
3	Ireland	3	1	0	2	72	82	−10	2
4	Jamaica	3	0	0	3	20	190	−170	0

Group D

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	PF	PA	PD	Pts	Qualification
1	Tonga	3	3	0	0	148	34	+114	6	Advance to knockout stage
2	Papua New Guinea	3	2	0	1	86	40	+46	4
3	Cook Islands	3	1	0	2	44	136	−92	2
4	Wales	3	0	0	3	18	86	−68	0

Knockout stage

The top 2 teams from each pool advanced to the quarter-finals. All quarter-finalists will automatically qualify for the 2025 Rugby League World Cup.

Women’s tournament

The 2021 tournament will be the sixth staging of the Women's Rugby League World Cup and will feature eight teams, an increase of two from 2017. Australia are the defending champions having won their second title last time out. 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).

Group A

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	PF	PA	PD	Pts	Qualification
1	England	3	3	0	0	168	12	+156	6	Advance to knockout stage
2	Papua New Guinea	3	2	0	1	108	54	+54	4
3	Canada	3	1	0	2	38	104	−66	2
4	Brazil	3	0	0	3	20	164	−144	0

Group B

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	PF	PA	PD	Pts	Qualification
1	Australia	3	3	0	0	176	8	+168	6	Advance to knockout stage
2	New Zealand	3	2	0	1	88	14	+74	4
3	Cook Islands	3	1	0	2	30	126	−96	2
4	France	3	0	0	3	18	164	−146	0

Knockout stage

Wheelchair tournament

The teams were drawn into two groups of four. 8 teams are competing, an increase of one from 2017. France are defending champions having won their second title in 2017. The two seeded teams were England (Group A) as hosts and France as holders (Group B).

Group A

Pos	Team	Pld	W	D	L	PF	PA	PD	Pts	Qualification
1	Australia	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	Advance to knockout stage
2	England	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
3	Ireland	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
4	Spain	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0

Group B

Pos	Team	Pld	W	D	L	PF	PA	PD	Pts	Qualification
1	France	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	Advance to knockout stage
2	Scotland	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
3	Wales	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
4	United States	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0

Knockout stage

Festival of World Cups

Additional competitions under the Festival of World Cups banner were planned to be held in Greater Manchester in the summer prior to the three centrepiece men's, women's and wheelchair tournaments.

The world cup organisers asked for expressions of interest for different tournaments in the summer of 2019 and received over 90 responses. Anticipated World Cup events were:

• the Masters Rugby League World Cup
• the men's and women's Armed Forces World Cup
• the men's and women's Student World Cup
• the men's Emerging Nations World Championship and the inaugural women's Emerging Nations World Championship
• the men's Police World Cup
• the Physical disability rugby league World Cup

On 27 August 2020 the organising body announced the postponement of the festival due to fund raising and squad selection issues for the participating nations caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, though World Cup events for the physical disabilty and masters variants were rescheduled.

Physical Disability

The inaugural world cup for physical disability rugby league went ahead between 23–30 October in Warrington. Australia, England, New Zealand, and Wales competed in a single round-robin tournament with the top two teams facing off in a final at the Halliwell Jones Stadium. The draw was made for the match schedule on 29 July 2022 during an episode of The Last Leg on which the main presenter, Adam Hills, announced his intention to be part of the Australian squad.

Group stage

Pos	Team	Pld	W	D	L	PF	PA	PD	Pts	Qualification
1	England	3	3	0	0	140	14	+126	6	Advance to Final
2	Wales	3	2	0	1	68	78	−10	4
3	New Zealand	3	1	0	2	62	104	−42	2
4	Australia	3	0	0	3	52	126	−74	0

Knockout stage

	Final
	30 October – Warrington
	England
	Wales
	Third place
	30 October - Warrington
	New Zealand
	Australia

International masters

The International masters festival went ahead on 13 November at York St John University. Australia, Canada, England, France, Ireland, and Wales took part.

Broadcasting

The Rugby League World Cup announced a partnership with the International Rugby League (IRL) in July 2020. The organisations will work together on match broadcast production and the sale of global broadcast rights.

In April 2019, it was reported that the digital strategy for the tournament will be led by Deloitte. In May 2019, the world cup organisers announced they were looking for an esport partner to engage new audiences with the sport.

Region	Broadcaster	Free-to-Air/ Subscription	Details
Australia	Foxtel (Fox League and Kayo Sports)	Subscription	All 61 matches across the three tournaments.
Denmark Estonia Finland Iceland Latvia Lithuania Netherlands Norway Poland Sweden	Viaplay	Subscription	TBA
France	BeIN Sports	Subscription	All 61 matches across the three tournaments.
	Sport en France	Free	All France men's, women's and wheelchair national team games and tournament finals.
New Zealand	Spark Sport	Subscription	All 61 matches live across the 31 men's, 15 women's and 15 wheelchair.
	Three	Free	Delayed coverage of all Kiwis and Kiwi Ferns matches.
Papua New Guinea	EM TV	Free	All 61 matches live across the 31 men's, 15 women's and 15 wheelchair.
United Kingdom	BBC	Free	All 61 matches live on BBC One or BBC Two as well as on BBC iPlayer, a Venue launch programme, highlights programme, the opening and closing matchdays of the 2021 Physical Disability Rugby League World Cup, and the commission of two rugby league themed documentaries; Clive Sullivan: Rugby League Legend and Women of Steel.
	OurLeague App	Subscription	All 31 matches live, exclusive post match interviews and OuRLeague highlights programme.
	RugbyAM (FreeSports)	Free	Highlights programme and post match interviews.
Algeria  Bahrain  Egypt  Iraq  Jordan  Kuwait  Lebanon  Libya  Morocco  Oman  Qatar  Sudan  Syria  Tunisia  United Arab Emirates  Yemen	Premier Sports Middle East	Subscription	TBA
Bangladesh Bhutan Brunei Cambodia Hong Kong India Indonesia Laos Macau Malaysia Maldives Mongolia Myanmar Nepal Pakistan Philippines Singapore South Korea Sri Lanka Taiwan Thailand Vietnam	Premier Sports Asia	Subscription	TBA
Germany Italy Spain United States Canada Mexico Central America South America Japan	FITE TV	Subscription	All 61 matches across the three tournaments live on pay per view, with select men's matches and the entire women's and wheelchair tournaments available through the FITE+ subscription service.

Marketing

Sponsorship

Legacy

The legacy of the 2021 Rugby League World Cup is the long-term impact of the combined World Cup tournaments. Named InspirationALL in October 2018, the chairman of the world cup organising committee, Jon Dutton, said "economic benefit is about 10% of what we’re focusing on, and 90% is the social benefit."

Created by RLWC 2021

The first project launched is a £10 million fund to develop facilities under the banner of "Created by RLWC 2021" was launched concurrently with the legacy announcement in October 2018 and enables sports clubs to apply for funds to develop facilities The funding comes from the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) and £9 million is allocated for major grants (over £15,000) and £1 million for smaller applications. The fund is administered by the Rugby Football League (RFL) in conjunction with Sport England.

The first major grants were announced in June 2019 and saw monies allocated for the construction of new clubhouses and changing facilities at locations in Salford and Shevington. £90,000 of minor grant funding was announced in July with 20 projects across England receiving funding.

In May 2021 it was announced that the National Lottery (United Kingdom) partner with the tournament to strengthen the CreatedBy program and allow RLWC2021 to deliver more projects to the community clubs especially those affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. The investment accompanied National Lottery sponsorship on RLWC2021 matchdays.

Inspired by RLWC 2021

The second project is "Inspired by RLWC 2021" which aims to get more people involved with rugby league. The first product, a resource pack on introducing and teaching rugby league in primary schools was released in July 2019.

Empowered by RLWC 2021

The third project and yet to be launched is "Empowered by RLWC 2021" which has the aim of involving people in the communities where the tournaments take place both in assisting at the tournaments but also continuing that involvement with rugby league afterwards by becoming involved with community rugby league clubs.

Climate Action

RLWC 2021 pledged their commitment to the United Nations Sports for Climate Action Framework in 2018. One of just four UK based sporting bodies to do so.

Tree for a Try

In partnership with the tournament's Logistics Partner, Kuehne + Nagel, it was announced that for every try scored across the Men’s, Women’s and Wheelchair tournaments, a tree would be planted. The trees will predominantly be planted in Brazil, one of the nations competing in the Women's tournament

Ceremonial Trees

21 ceremonial trees will be planted across host towns and cities in England.

Notes

References

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External links

• Official website

• 2021 Rugby League World Cup
• 2022 in rugby league
• 2022 in English sport
• Rugby league events postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic
• Scheduled rugby football competitions
• October 2022 sports events in the United Kingdom
• November 2022 sports events in the United Kingdom