Upcoming Season: | 2024 Oceania Rugby Women's Championship |
Pixels: | 50px |
Oceania Rugby Women's Championship | |
Sport: | Rugby union |
Inaugural: | 2016 |
Teams: | 4 |
Countries: | |
Champ Season: | 2024 |
Most Successful Club: | (4 titles) |
Website: | oceania.rugby |
Oceania Rugby Women's Championship is an international women's rugby union competition contested by women's national teams from Oceania.[1] The current Champions are Samoa who claimed their first Oceania title at the Championship in Australia. Fiji has won the most titles with four.
The Oceania Rugby Women's Championship was introduced in 2016, and since its inception, also serves as a Rugby World Cup qualification tournament.
Before the establishment of the Championship there were few international fixtures for women's rugby in the region which hindered its progress. Matches were restricted to occasional test matches as part of the Rugby World Cup qualification process. It was established to provide more regular and consistent international competitions for the region.
The first tournament was held in 2016 in Suva, the match was between Fiji and Papua New Guinea as a part of the Rugby World Cup 2017 qualification. The Fijiana's won and moved onto a Repechage tournament against Hong Kong and Japan.
2018 saw Samoa and Tonga join Fiji and Papua New Guinea in Lautoka. Fiji were the eventual victors.
In 2019, six teams contested the title, with development squads from Australia and New Zealand joining their Pacific neighbours in Lautoka.[2] The Black Ferns Development XV won the 2019 Oceania Championship in Lautoka, Fiji.[3]
The 2020 Championship was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.[4] In 2022, Fiji won the Oceania Championship to clinch their third title.[5] [6] [7]
Samoa created history in winning their first Oceania Championship title and confirmed their place for WXV 2 in the inaugural WXV tournament, Fiji as runners-up qualified for the WXV 3.[8] [9]
Year | Venue | Teams | Winner | Runner-up | Third | Fourth | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
2016 | Suva | 2 | |||||
2018 | Lautoka | 4 | |||||
2019 | Lautoka | 6 | |||||
2020 | Not held due to the COVID-19 pandemic | ||||||
2021 | |||||||
2022 | Pukekohe | 4 | |||||
2023 | Gold Coast | 4 | |||||
2024 | Brisbane | 4 |