1999 Rugby Union World Cup

Results of the 1999 Rugby World Cup

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The fourth Rugby World Cup broke new ground as for the first time the big eight nations did not qualify automatically. Only the champions, the runners-up, the third place play-off winners from 1995 and the host nation was afforded that luxury.

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This meant that South Africa, New Zealand, France and Wales were assured of their places in the expanded 20-team tournament with 65 nations taking part in the qualification process for the other 16 places.

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Another innovation for the 1999 tournament, which also featured matches in England, France, Scotland and Ireland, was the introduction of a repechage, a second chance for teams that had finished runners-up in each qualifying zone.

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Uruguay and Tonga were the first nations to profit from the Repechage and took their places alongside fellow qualifiers Australia, England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Italy, Argentina, Fiji, Romania, Canada, Namibia, Japan, Spain and the United States.

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These 20 nations were split into five pools of four, a scenario that necessitated a quarter-final play-off round involving the five runners-up and best third placed team to decide who would join the Pool winners in the last eight.

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The Millennium Stadium then saw Australia take on the French in an eagerly anticipated final. France had of course reached the inaugural final in 1987 but, just as on that occasion, they simply had nothing left as Australia became the first nation to win the World Cup twice with a 35-12 triumph.

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