How the ‘first rugby World Cup’ reunited the Empire
Pioneering global tournament in 1919 helped to soothe post-war tensions, writes Daniel Schofield
The RFU even rescinded its ban on players from rugby league
Amid the devastating aftermath of the First World War, the ties that held Britain and its colonies together were fracturing. That was reflected within rugby union, which had been facing an existential crisis since rugby league was formed in 1895.
It was in this context in 1919 that the War Office proposed setting up a rugby competition between the British Army and its “dominions”, as Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and Canada were then known. Originally labelled the Inter-services Competition, it became known as the King’s Cup and was effectively rugby’s first World Cup.
In fact, there is an argument that it was the first truly global team competition ever staged, with the football World
Cup still 11 years away and the Olympics mainly revolving around individual competitions (the team events often consisted of just three or more entrants).
Meticulously detailed in Stephen Cooper’s excellent book After the
Final Whistle, it is striking how little has changed in some regards, with accounts of transport chaos at Twickenham, French protests and a Welford Road crowd calling for an Australian, Sgt Bradley, to be sent off for persistent foul play.
Just the organisation of the tournament was a feat in itself. Sixteen matches were played in a round-robin format across six weeks in eight different venues, deliberately chosen to reflect a geographical spread of the country including Inverleith, Rodney Parade, Kingsholm, Bradford and Twickenham.
Yet its purpose went far beyond being just a sporting tournament, with King George V playing a leading role in its creation. “In this new, uncertain peace, it was an opportunity to restate the values that had carried the Empire through the conflict,” Cooper writes. “This was about more than watching rugby: this time it was the future of the Empire that concerned him [George V] and the need not only to thank his Dominions for their role in the victory, but also to hold together these colonial partners who were straining at the imperial leash.”
Tensions were also high between the Rugby Football Union and its New Zealand and Australian counterparts over English suspicions of professionalism and unsportsmanlike conduct. After each country had lost so many of its internationals during the war, the tournament was an opportunity to restore unity as well as to reassert the RFU’S authority. The RFU even rescinded its ban on rugby league players, although only one, Billy Seddon, was selected.
Originally, there were plans for separate British Army, Air Force and Navy sides, but the Navy withdrew over fears it could not raise a side, with the Army forming “Mother Country” and the Air Force becoming a separate team.
Their team included William Wavell Wakefield, who would go on to captain England to consecutive Grand Slams, and Major Philip Henry Lawless, a future rugby reporter for The Daily
Telegraph and grandfather to novelist Sebastian Faulks.
Class was clearly an overwhelming factor in selection for the Mother Country, whose ranks included 20 officers, but no private soldiers. New Zealand’s team, by contrast, contained just two officers.
New Zealand, captained by Sgt Maj James Ryan, won their opening four games, including their encounter against the Mother Country, but in a possible portent of their future World Cup heartbreaks, lost 6-5 to Australia in their final group game.
With the Mother Country also winning four games, a decider was set for Twickenham on April 16. This time New Zealand held their nerve, winning 9-3. There was one final match as France, who had not been invited despite the wartime alliance, came over for an invitational match against the new world champions and were duly trounced 20-3.
How different the sport might have been had the King’s Cup been repeated, but the RFU was too insular to seize the opportunity. How times change.