Top 100 momentsNo. 78
The first Rugby World Cup
New Zealand and Australia host a new tournament. The All Blacks lift it. A sport of tours and invitations gets a world championship.
Rugby union had been tours, Home Nations, and a stubborn amateurism. In 1987 a World Cup exists anyway, in New Zealand and Australia, sixteen teams. The All Blacks win it. Jonah Lomu is still a few years away. The trophy is real.
Professionalism will follow in 1995. The World Cup is the shop window that makes the money imaginable. France, South Africa, England, more All Blacks — the tournament becomes rugby’s World Cup, not a curiosity.
Every later final at a packed stadium is downstream of a first edition that still felt like an experiment with better catering.