title: Midnight in Paris

text: "Midnight in Paris" has been compared to Allen's "The Purple Rose of Cairo" (1985), in that the functioning of the magical realism therein is never explained. David Edelstein, "New York", commended that approach, stating that it eliminates, "the sci-fi wheels and pulleys that tend to suck up so much screen time in time-travel movies." He goes on to applaud the film stating that, "this supernatural comedy isn't just Allen's best film in more than a decade; it's the only one that manages to rise above its tidy parable structure and be easy, graceful, and glancingly funny, as if buoyed by its befuddled hero's enchantment."


title: Midnight in Paris

text: Peter Johnson of PopCitizen felt that the film's nature as a "period piece" was far superior to its comedic components, which he referred to as lacking. "While the period settings of "Midnight in Paris" are almost worth seeing the film ... it hardly qualifies as a moral compass to those lost in a nostalgic revelry," he asserts.


title: Midnight in Paris

text: Joe Morgenstern of "The Wall Street Journal" acknowledged the cast and the look of the film and, despite some familiarities with the film's conflict, praised Allen's work on the film. He wrote, "For the filmmaker who brought these intertwined universes into being, the film represents new energy in a remarkable career.".


title: Midnight in Paris

text: Peter Bradshaw of "The Guardian", giving the film 3 out of 5 stars, described it as "an amiable "amuse-bouche"" and "sporadically entertaining, light, shallow, self-plagiarising." He goes on to add that it's "a romantic fantasy adventure to be compared with the vastly superior ideas of his comparative youth, such as the 1985 movie "The Purple Rose of Cairo"." In October 2013, the film was voted by the "Guardian" readers as the ninth best film directed by Woody Allen.


title: Midnight in Paris

text: More scathing is Richard Corliss of "Time", who describes the film as "pure Woody Allen. Which is not to say great or even good Woody, but a distillation of the filmmaker's passions and crotchets, and of his tendency to pass draconian judgment on characters the audience is not supposed to like. ... his "Midnight" strikes not sublime chimes but the clangor of snap judgments and frayed fantasy."


title: Midnight in Paris

text: The film was well received in France. The website Allocine (Hello Cinema) gave it 4.2 out of 5 stars based on a sample of twenty reviews. Ten of the reviews gave it a full five stars, including "Le Figaro", which praised the film's evocation of its themes and said "one leaves the screening with a smile on one's lips".


title: Midnight in Paris

text: The William Faulkner estate later filed a lawsuit against Sony Pictures Classics for the film's bit of dialogue, "The past is not dead. Actually, it's not even past," a paraphrasing of an often-quoted line from Faulkner's 1950 book "Requiem for a Nun" ("The past is never dead. It's not even past."), claiming that the paraphrasing was an unlicensed use of the estate. Faulkner is directly credited in the dialogue when Gil claims to have met the writer at a dinner party (though Faulkner is never physically portrayed in the film). Julie Ahrens of the Fair Use Project at the Stanford University's Center for Internet and Society was quoted as saying in response to the charge, "The idea that one person can control the use of those particular words seems ridiculous to me. Any kind of literary allusion is ordinarily celebrated. This seems to squarely fall in that tradition." Sony's response stated that they consider the action "a frivolous lawsuit". In July 2013, a federal judge in Mississippi dismissed the lawsuit on fair use grounds.


title: Midnight in Paris

text: The soundtrack was released on December 9, 2011, and released on Blu-ray and DVD on December 20, 2011.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: The greenhouse effect is a process that occurs when energy from a planet's host star goes through the planet's atmosphere and heats the planet's surface, but greenhouse gases in the atmosphere prevent some of the heat from returning directly to space, resulting in a warmer planet. Earth's natural greenhouse effect makes life as we know it possible and carbon dioxide plays a significant role in providing for the relatively high temperature on Earth. The greenhouse effect is a process by which thermal radiation from a planetary atmosphere warms the planet's surface beyond the temperature it would have in the absence of its atmosphere. Without the greenhouse effect, the Earth's average surface temperature would be about compared to Earth's actual average surface temperature of approximately 14 °C (57.2 °F). In addition to the naturally present greenhouse gases, human-caused increases in greenhouse gases trap greater amounts of heat, causing the Earth to become warmer over time.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: Anything radiates energy related to its temperature: the Sun—at about —sends most of its energy as visible and near infrared light, while Earth's average surface temperature—at about —emits longer-wavelength infrared, radiant heat. The atmosphere is transparent to most incoming sunlight, and allows its energy through to heat the surface. Most gases in the atmosphere are transparent to infrared, but the small proportion of the atmosphere that constitutes greenhouse gases absorbs some of the heat emitted by the surface rather than letting it escape into space. These greenhouse gas molecules then emit radiant heat in all directions, passing heat to the surrounding air and warming other greenhouse gas molecules. Radiant heat going downwards further increases the temperature of the surface, which then returns heat to the atmosphere in a positive feedback cycle. Without Earth's natural greenhouse effect the Earth would be more than colder.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: A "runaway" greenhouse effect occurs when greenhouse gases accumulate in the atmosphere through a positive feedback cycle to such an extent that they substantially block thermal radiation (heat) from escaping into space, thus preventing the planet from cooling. The runaway greenhouse effect occurred with carbon dioxide and water vapor on Venus. It is unlikely that human-caused greenhouse gas emissions alone could trigger a runaway effect on Earth.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: The term "greenhouse effect" comes from a flawed analogy to greenhouses, which have transparent glass that passes sunlight but retains heat by "physically" restricting air movement; radiative effects are not involved.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: The existence of the greenhouse effect, while not named as such, was proposed by Joseph Fourier in 1824. The argument and the evidence were further strengthened by Claude Pouillet in 1827 and 1838. In 1856 Eunice Newton Foote demonstrated that the warming effect of the sun is greater for air with water vapour than for dry air, and the effect is even greater with carbon dioxide. She concluded that "An atmosphere of that gas would give to our earth a high temperature..." John Tyndall was the first to measure the infrared absorption and emission of various gases and vapors. From 1859 onwards, he showed that the effect was due to a very small proportion of the atmosphere, with the main gases having no effect, and was largely due to water vapor, though small percentages of hydrocarbons and carbon dioxide had a significant effect. The effect was more fully quantified by Svante Arrhenius in 1896, who made the first quantitative prediction of global warming due to a hypothetical doubling of atmospheric carbon dioxide. However, the term "greenhouse" was not used to refer to this effect by any of these scientists; the term was first used in this way by Nils Gustaf Ekholm in 1901.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: The greenhouse effect is defined as follows:The infrared radiative effect of all infrared-absorbing constituents in the atmosphere. Greenhouse gases (GHGs), clouds, and some aerosols absorb terrestrial radiation emitted by the Earth's surface and elsewhere in the atmosphere. These substances emit infrared radiation in all directions, but, everything else being equal, the net amount emitted to space is normally less than would have been emitted in the absence of these absorbers because of the decline of temperature with altitude in the troposphere and the consequent weakening of emission. An increase in the concentration of GHGs increases the magnitude of this effect; the difference is sometimes called the enhanced greenhouse effect. The change in a GHG concentration because of anthropogenic emissions contributes to an instantaneous radiative forcing. Earth's surface temperature and troposphere warm in response to this forcing, gradually restoring the radiative balance at the top of the atmosphere.Earth receives energy from the Sun in the form of ultraviolet, visible, and near-infrared radiation. About 26% of the incoming solar energy is reflected back to space by the atmosphere and clouds, and 19% is absorbed by the atmosphere and clouds. Most of the remaining energy is absorbed at the surface of Earth. Because the Earth's surface is colder than the Sun, it radiates at wavelengths that are much longer than the wavelengths that were absorbed. Most of this thermal radiation is absorbed by the atmosphere and warms it. The atmosphere also gains heat by sensible and latent heat fluxes from the surface. The atmosphere radiates energy both upwards and downwards; the part radiated downwards is absorbed by the surface of Earth. This leads to a higher equilibrium temperature than if the atmosphere did not radiate.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: An ideal thermally conductive blackbody at the same distance from the Sun as Earth would have a temperature of about . However, because Earth reflects about 30% of the incoming sunlight, this idealized planet's effective temperature (the temperature of a blackbody that would emit the same amount of radiation) would be about . The surface temperature of this hypothetical planet is below Earth's actual surface temperature of approximately . The greenhouse effect is the contribution of greenhouse gases and aerosols to this difference, with imperfect modelling of clouds being the main uncertainty.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: The idealized greenhouse model is a simplification. In reality, the atmosphere near the Earth's surface is largely opaque to thermal radiation and most heat loss from the surface is by convection. However radiative energy losses become increasingly important higher in the atmosphere, largely because of the decreasing concentration of water vapor, an important greenhouse gas. Rather than the surface itself, it is more realistic to think of the greenhouse effect as applying to a layer in the mid-troposphere, which is effectively coupled to the surface by a lapse rate. A simple picture also assumes a steady state, but in the real world, the diurnal cycle, as well as the seasonal cycle and weather disturbances, complicate matters. Solar heating applies only during daytime. At night the atmosphere cools somewhat, but not greatly because the thermal inertia of the climate system resists changes both day and night, as well as for longer periods. Diurnal temperature changes decrease with height in the atmosphere.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: Within the region where radiative effects are important, the description given by the idealized greenhouse model becomes realistic. Earth's surface, warmed to an "effective temperature" around , radiates long-wavelength, infrared heat in the range of 4–100 μm. At these wavelengths, greenhouse gases that were largely transparent to incoming solar radiation are more absorbent. Each layer of the atmosphere with greenhouse gases absorbs some of the heat being radiated upwards from lower layers. It reradiates in all directions, both upwards and downwards; in equilibrium (by definition) the same amount as it has absorbed. This results in more warmth below. Increasing the concentration of the gases increases the amount of absorption and re-radiation, and thereby further warms the layers and ultimately the surface below.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: Greenhouse gases—including most diatomic gases with two different atoms (such as carbon monoxide, CO) and all gases with three or more atoms—are able to absorb and emit infrared radiation. Though more than 99% of the dry atmosphere is IR transparent (because the main constituents—, , and Ar—are not able to directly absorb or emit infrared radiation), intermolecular collisions cause the energy absorbed and emitted by the greenhouse gases to be shared with the other, non-IR-active, gases.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: A greenhouse gas (GHG) is a gas capable of trapping solar radiation energy within a planet's atmosphere. Greenhouse gases contribute most of the greenhouse effect in Earth's energy budget.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: Greenhouse gases can be divided into two types, direct and indirect. Gases that can directly absorb solar energy are direct greenhouse gases, e.g., water vapor, carbon dioxide and ozone. The molecules of these gases can directly absorb solar radiation at certain ranges of wavelength. Some gases are indirect greenhouse gases, as they do not absorb solar energy directly or significantly, but have capability of producing other greenhouse gases. For example, methane plays an important role in producing tropospheric ozone and formation of more carbon dioxide. NO and CO can also produce tropospheric ozone and carbon dioxide through photochemical processes.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: By their percentage contribution to the overall greenhouse effect on Earth, the four major greenhouse gases are:


title: Greenhouse effect

text: It is not practical to assign a specific percentage to each gas because the absorption and emission bands of the gases overlap (hence the ranges given above). A water molecule only stays in the atmosphere for an average 8 to 10 days, which corresponds with high variability in the contribution from clouds and humidity at any particular time and location.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: There are other influential gases that contribute to the greenhouse effect, including nitrous oxide (NO), perfluorocarbons (PFCs), chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), and sulfur hexafluoride (SF). These gases are mostly produced through human activities, thus they have played important parts in climate change.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: Concentration change of greenhouse gases from 1750 to 2019 (ppm: parts per million; ppb: parts per billion):


title: Greenhouse effect

text: The global warming potential (GWP) of a greenhouse gas is calculated by quantifying the lifetime and the efficiency of greenhouse effect of the gas. Typically, nitrous oxide has a lifetime of about 121 years, and over 270 times higher GWP than carbon dioxide for 20-year time span. Sulfur hexafluoride has a lifetime of over 3000 years and 25000 times higher GWP than carbon dioxide.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: Clouds play an important part in global radiative balance and thin cirrus clouds have some greenhouse effects. They can absorb and emit infrared radiation and thus affect the radiative properties of the atmosphere. Clouds include liquid clouds, mixed-phase clouds and ice clouds. Liquid clouds are low clouds and have negative radiative forcing. Mixed-phase clouds are clouds coexisted with both liquid water and solid ice at subfreezing temperatures and their radiative properties (optical depth or optical thickness) are substantially influenced by the liquid content. Ice clouds are high clouds and their radiative forcing depends on the ice crystal number concentration, cloud thickness and ice water content.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: The radiative properties of liquid clouds depend strongly on cloud microphysical properties, such as cloud liquid water content and cloud drop size distribution. The liquid clouds with higher liquid water content and smaller water droplets will have a stronger negative radiative forcing. The cloud liquid contents are usually related to the surface and atmospheric circulations. Over the warm ocean, the atmosphere is usually rich with water vapor and thus the liquid clouds contain higher liquid water content. When the moist air flows converge in the clouds and generate strong updrafts, the water content can be much higher. Aerosols will influence the cloud drop size distribution. For example, in the polluted industrial regions with lots of aerosols, the water droplets in liquid clouds are often small.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: The mixed phase clouds have negative radiative forcing. The radiative forcing of mix-phase clouds has a larger uncertainty than liquid clouds. One reason is that the microphysics are much more complicated because the coexistence of both liquid and solid water. For example, Wegener–Bergeron–Findeisen process can deplete large amounts of water droplets and enlarge small ice crystals to large ones in a short period of time. Hallett-Mossop process will shatter the liquid droplets in the collision with large ice crystals and freeze into a lot of small ice splinters. The cloud radiative properties can change dramatically during these processes because small ice crystals can reflect much more sun lights and generate larger negative radiative forcing, compared with large water droplets.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: Cirrus clouds can either enhance or reduce the greenhouse effects, depending on the cloud thickness. Thin cirrus is usually considered to have positive radiative forcing and thick cirrus has negative radiative forcing. Ice water content and ice size distribution also determines cirrus radiative properties. The larger ice water content is, the more cooling effects cirrus have. When cloud ice water contents are the same, cirrus with more smaller ice crystals have larger cooling effects, compared with cirrus with fewer larger ice crystals. Some scientists suggest doing some cirrus seeding into thin cirrus clouds in order to decrease the size of ice crystals and thus reduce their greenhouse effects, but some other studies doubt its efficiency and think it would be useless to fight with global warming.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: Atmospheric aerosols are typically defined as suspensions of liquid, solid, or mixed particles with various chemical and physical properties, which play a really important role in modulating earth energy budget that will further cause climate change. There are two major sources of the atmospheric aerosols, one is natural sources, and the other is anthropogenic sources. For example, desert dust, sea salt, volcanic ash, volatile organic compounds (VOC) from vegetation and smoke from forest fire are some of the important natural sources of aerosols. For the aerosols that are generated from human activities, such as fossil fuel burning, deforestation fires, and burning of agricultural waste, are considered as anthropogenic aerosols. The amount of anthropogenic aerosols has been dramatically increases since preindustrial times, which is considered as a major contribution to the global air pollution. Since these aerosols have different chemical composition and physical properties, they can produce different Radiative forcing effect to warm or cool the global climate.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: Impact of atmospheric aerosols on climate can be classified as direct or indirect with respect to radiative forcing of the climate system. Aerosols can directly scatter and absorb solar and infrared radiance in the atmosphere, hence it has a direct radiative forcing to the global climate system. Aerosols can also act as cloud condensation nuclei (CCN) to form clouds, resulting in changing the formation and precipitation efficiency of liquid water, ice and mixed phase clouds, thereby causing an indirect radiative forcing associated with these changes in cloud properties.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: Aerosols that mainly scatter solar radiation can reflect solar radiation back to space, which will cause cooling effect to the global climate. All of the atmospheric aerosols have such capability to scatter incoming solar radiation. But only a few types of aerosols can absorb solar radiation, such as Black carbon (BC), organic carbon (OC) and mineral dust, which can induce non negligible warming effect to the Earth atmosphere. The emission of black carbon is really large in the developing countries, such as China and India, and this increase trend is still expected to continue. Black carbon can be transported over long distances, and mixed with other aerosols along the way.The solar-absorption efficiency has positive correlation with the ratio of black carbon to sulphate, thus people should focus both on the black carbon emissions and the atmospheric ratio of carbon to sulphate. Particle size and mixing ratio can not only determine the absorption efficiency of BC, but also affect the lifetime of BC. The surface albedo of the surfaces covered by snow or ice could be reduced due to the deposition of these kinds of absorbing aerosol, which will also cause heating effect. The heating effect from black carbon at high elevations is just important as carbon dioxide in the melting of snowpacks and glaciers. In addition to these absorbing aerosols, it is found that the stratospheric aerosol can also induce strong local warming effect by increasing long wave radiation to the surface and reducing the outgoing longwave radiation.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: Strengthening of the greenhouse effect through human activities is known as the enhanced (or anthropogenic) greenhouse effect. As well as being inferred from measurements by the CERES satellite throughout the 21st century, this increase in radiative forcing from human activity has been observed directly, and is attributable mainly to increased atmospheric carbon dioxide levels. According to the 2014 Assessment Report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, "atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide are unprecedented in at least the last 800,000 years. Their effects, together with those of other anthropogenic drivers, have been detected throughout the climate system and are extremely likely to have been the dominant cause of the observed warming since the mid-20th century'".


title: Greenhouse effect

text: Over the past 800,000 years, ice core data shows that carbon dioxide has varied from values as low as 180 ppm to the pre-industrial level of 270 ppm. Paleoclimatologists consider variations in carbon dioxide concentration to be a fundamental factor influencing climate variations over this time scale.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: The "greenhouse effect" of the atmosphere is named by analogy to greenhouses which become warmer in sunlight. However, a greenhouse is not primarily warmed by the "greenhouse effect".


title: Greenhouse effect

text: "Greenhouse effect" is actually a misnomer since heating in the usual greenhouse is due to the reduction of convection, while the "greenhouse effect" works by preventing absorbed heat from leaving the structure through radiative transfer.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: A greenhouse is built of any material that passes sunlight: usually glass or plastic. The sun warms the ground and contents inside just like the outside, and these then warm the air. Outside, the warm air near the surface rises and mixes with cooler air aloft, keeping the temperature lower than inside, where the air continues to heat up because it is confined within the greenhouse. This can be demonstrated by opening a small window near the roof of a greenhouse: the temperature will drop considerably. It was demonstrated experimentally (R. W. Wood, 1909) that a (not heated) "greenhouse" with a cover of rock salt (which is transparent to infrared) heats up an enclosure similarly to one with a glass cover. Thus greenhouses work primarily by preventing convective cooling.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: Heated greenhouses are yet another matter: as they have an internal source of heating, it is desirable to minimize the amount of heat leaking out by radiative cooling. This can be done through the use of adequate glazing.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: It is possible in theory to build a greenhouse that lowers its thermal emissivity during dark hours; such a greenhouse would trap heat by two different physical mechanisms, combining multiple greenhouse effects, one of which more closely resembles the atmospheric mechanism, rendering the misnomer debate moot.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: The anti-greenhouse effect is a mechanism similar and symmetrical to the greenhouse effect: in the greenhouse effect, the atmosphere lets radiation in while not letting thermal radiation out, thus warming the body surface; in the anti-greenhouse effect, the atmosphere keeps radiation out while letting thermal radiation out, which lowers the equilibrium surface temperature. Such an effect has been proposed for Saturn's moon Titan.


title: Greenhouse effect

text: A runaway greenhouse effect occurs if positive feedbacks lead to the evaporation of all greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. A runaway greenhouse effect involving carbon dioxide and water vapor has long ago been hypothesized to have occurred on Venus, this idea is still largely accepted. The planet Venus experienced a runaway greenhouse effect, resulting in an atmosphere which is 96% carbon dioxide, and a surface atmospheric pressure roughly the same as found underwater on Earth. Venus may have had water oceans, but they would have boiled off as the mean surface temperature rose to the current .


title: Greenhouse effect

text: A 2012 journal article stated that almost all lines of evidence indicate that is unlikely to be possible to trigger a full runaway greenhouse on Earth, merely by adding greenhouse gases to the atmosphere. However, the authors cautioned that "our understanding of the dynamics, thermodynamics, radiative transfer and cloud physics of hot and steamy atmospheres is weak", and that we "cannot therefore completely rule out the possibility that human actions might cause a transition, if not to full runaway, then at least to a much warmer climate state than the present one". A 2013 article concluded that runaway greenhouse "could in theory be triggered by increased greenhouse forcing", but that "anthropogenic emissions are probably insufficient".


title: Greenhouse effect

text: Apart from the Earth, there are other planets in the solar system that also have greenhouse effect. The greenhouse effect on Venus is particularly large, which brings its surface temperature to as high as . This is due to several reasons:


title: Greenhouse effect

text: "Venus experienced a runaway greenhouse effect in the past, and we expect that Earth will in about 2 billion years as solar luminosity increases".


title: Greenhouse effect

text: Titan is a body with both a greenhouse effect and an anti-greenhouse effect. The presence of N, CH, and H in the atmosphere contribute to a greenhouse effect, increasing the surface temperature by 21K over the expected temperature of the body with no atmosphere. The existence of a high-altitude haze, which absorbs wavelengths of solar radiation but is transparent to infrared, contribute to an anti-greenhouse effect of approximately 9K. The net effect of these two phenomena result is a net warming of 21K - 9K = 12K, so Titan is 12 K warmer than it would be if there were no atmosphere.


title: Rugby union

text: Rugby union, commonly known simply as rugby, is a close-contact team sport that originated at Rugby School in the first half of the 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand. In its most common form, a game is played between two teams of 15 players each, using an oval-shaped ball on a rectangular field called a pitch. The field has H-shaped goalposts at both ends.


title: Rugby union

text: Rugby union is a popular sport around the world, played by people of all genders, ages and sizes. In 2014, there were more than 6 million people playing worldwide, of whom 2.36 million were registered players. World Rugby, previously called the International Rugby Football Board (IRFB) and the International Rugby Board (IRB), has been the governing body for rugby union since 1886, and currently has 101 countries as full members and 18 associate members.


title: Rugby union

text: In 1845, the first laws were written by students attending Rugby School; other significant events in the early development of rugby include the decision by Blackheath F.C. to leave The Football Association in 1863 and, in 1895, the split between rugby union and rugby league. Historically rugby union was an amateur sport, but in 1995 formal restrictions on payments to players were removed, making the game openly professional at the highest level for the first time.


title: Rugby union

text: Rugby union spread from the Home Nations of Great Britain and Ireland, with other early exponents of the sport including Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and France. The sport is followed primarily in the British Isles, France, Georgia, Oceania, Southern Africa, Argentina, and to a lesser extent Italy, Uruguay, the United States, Canada, and Japan, its growth occurring during the expansion of the British Empire and through French proponents (Rugby Europe) in Europe. Countries that have adopted rugby union as their "de facto" national sport include Fiji, Georgia, Madagascar, New Zealand, Samoa, Tonga, and Wales.


title: Rugby union

text: International matches have taken place since 1871 when the first game was played between Scotland and England at Raeburn Place in Edinburgh. The Rugby World Cup, first held in 1987, is held every four years. The Six Nations Championship in Europe and The Rugby Championship in the Southern Hemisphere are other important international competitions that are held annually.


title: Rugby union

text: National club and provincial competitions include the Premiership in England, the Top 14 in France, the Bunnings NPC in New Zealand, the League One in Japan and the Currie Cup in South Africa. Other transnational club competitions include the United Rugby Championship of club teams from Ireland, Italy, Scotland, South Africa and Wales, European Rugby Champions Cup in Europe, and Super Rugby Pacific in Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific Islands.


title: Rugby union

text: Rugby football stems from the form of the game played at Rugby School, which former pupils then introduced to their universities.


title: Rugby union

text: Former Rugby School student Albert Pell is credited with having formed the first "football" team while a student at Cambridge University. Major private schools each used different rules during this early period, with former pupils from Rugby and Eton attempting to carry their preferred rules through to their universities. A significant event in the early development of rugby football was the production of a written set of rules at Rugby School in 1845, followed by the Cambridge Rules that were drawn up in 1848.


title: Rugby union

text: Formed in 1863, the national governing body The Football Association (FA) began codifying a set of universal football rules. These new rules specifically banned players from running with the ball in hand and also disallowed hacking (kicking players in the shins), both of which were legal and common tactics under the Rugby School's rules of the sport. In protest at the imposition of the new rules, the Blackheath Club left the FA followed by several other clubs that also favoured the "Rugby Rules". Although these clubs decided to ban hacking soon afterwards, the split was permanent, and the FA's codified rules became known as "association football" whilst the clubs that had favoured the Rugby Rules formed the Rugby Football Union in 1871, and their code became known as "rugby football".


title: Rugby union

text: In 1895, there was a major schism within rugby football in England in which numerous clubs from Northern England resigned from the RFU over the issue of reimbursing players for time lost from their workplaces. The split highlighted the social and class divisions in the sport in England. Although the rules of the game were not a factor in the split, the breakaway teams subsequently adopted some rule changes and this became the separate code of "rugby league". The RFU's code thereafter took on the name "rugby union" to differentiate it from rugby league, but both versions of the sport are known simply as "rugby" throughout most of the world.


title: Rugby union

text: The first rugby football international was played on 27 March 1871 between Scotland and England in Edinburgh. Scotland won the game 1–0. By 1881 both Ireland and Wales had representative teams and in 1883 the first international competition, the Home Nations Championship had begun. 1883 is also the year of the first rugby sevens tournament, the Melrose Sevens, which is still held annually.


title: Rugby union

text: Two important overseas tours took place in 1888: a British Isles team visited Australia and New Zealand—although a private venture, it laid the foundations for future British and Irish Lions tours; and the 1888–89 New Zealand Native football team brought the first overseas team to British spectators.


title: Rugby union

text: During the early history of rugby union, a time before commercial air travel, teams from different continents rarely met. The first two notable tours both took place in 1888the British Isles team touring New Zealand and Australia, followed by the New Zealand team touring Europe. Traditionally the most prestigious tours were the Southern Hemisphere countries of Australia, New Zealand and South Africa making a tour of a Northern Hemisphere, and the return tours made by a joint British and Irish team. Tours would last for months, due to long traveling times and the number of games undertaken; the 1888 New Zealand team began their tour in Hawkes Bay in June and did not complete their schedule until August 1889, having played 107 rugby matches. Touring international sides would play Test matches against international opponents, including national, club and county sides in the case of Northern Hemisphere rugby, or provincial/state sides in the case of Southern Hemisphere rugby.


title: Rugby union

text: Between 1905 and 1908, all three major Southern Hemisphere rugby countries sent their first touring teams to the Northern Hemisphere: New Zealand in 1905, followed by South Africa in 1906 and Australia in 1908. All three teams brought new styles of play, fitness levels and tactics, and were far more successful than critics had expected.


title: Rugby union

text: The New Zealand 1905 touring team performed a haka before each match, leading Welsh Rugby Union administrator Tom Williams to suggest that Wales player Teddy Morgan lead the crowd in singing the Welsh National Anthem, "Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau", as a response. After Morgan began singing, the crowd joined in: the first time a national anthem was sung at the start of a sporting event. In 1905 France played England in its first international match.


title: Rugby union

text: Rugby union was included as an event in the Olympic Games four times during the early 20th century. No international rugby games and union-sponsored club matches were played during the First World War, but competitions continued through service teams such as the New Zealand Army team. During the Second World War no international matches were played by most countries, though Italy, Germany and Romania played a limited number of games, and Cambridge and Oxford continued their annual University Match.


title: Rugby union

text: The first officially sanctioned international rugby sevens tournament took place in 1973 at Murrayfield, one of Scotland's biggest stadiums, as part of the Scottish Rugby Union centenary celebrations.


title: Rugby union

text: In 1987 the first Rugby World Cup was held in Australia and New Zealand, and the inaugural winners were New Zealand. The first World Cup Sevens tournament was held at Murrayfield in 1993. Rugby Sevens was introduced into the Commonwealth Games in 1998 and was added to the Olympic Games of 2016. Both men and women's Sevens took place at the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo.


title: Rugby union

text: Rugby union was an amateur sport until the IRB declared the game "open" in August 1995 (shortly after the completion of the 1995 World Cup), removing restrictions on payments to players. However, the pre-1995 period of rugby union was marked by frequent accusations of "shamateurism", including an investigation in Britain by a House of Commons Select committee in early 1995. Following the introduction of professionalism trans-national club competitions were started, with the Heineken Cup in the Northern Hemisphere and Super Rugby in the Southern Hemisphere.


title: Rugby union

text: The Tri Nations, an annual international tournament involving Australia, New Zealand and South Africa, kicked off in 1996. In 2012, this competition was extended to include Argentina, a country whose impressive performances in international games (especially finishing in third place in the 2007 Rugby World Cup) was deemed to merit inclusion in the competition. As a result of the expansion to four teams, the tournament was renamed The Rugby Championship.


title: Rugby union

text: Each team starts the match with 15 players on the field and seven or eight substitutes. Players in a team are divided into eight forwards (two more than in rugby league) and seven backs.


title: Rugby union

text: The main responsibilities of the forward players are to gain and retain possession of the ball. Forwards play a vital role in tackling and rucking opposing players. Players in these positions are generally bigger and stronger and take part in the scrum and line-out. The forwards are often collectively referred to as the 'pack', especially when in the scrum formation.


title: Rugby union

text: The front row consists of three players: two props (the loosehead prop and the tighthead prop) and the hooker. The role of the two props is to support the hooker during scrums, to provide support for the jumpers during line-outs and to provide strength and power in rucks and mauls. The third position in the front row is the hooker. The hooker is a key position in attacking and defensive play and is responsible for winning the ball in the scrum. Hookers normally throw the ball in at line-outs.


title: Rugby union

text: The second row consists of two locks or lock forwards. Locks are usually the tallest players in the team, and specialise as line-out jumpers. The main role of the lock in line-outs is to make a standing jump, often supported by the other forwards, to either collect the thrown ball or ensure the ball comes down on their side. Locks also have an important role in the scrum, binding directly behind the three front row players and providing forward drive.


title: Rugby union

text: The back row, not to be confused with 'Backs', is the third and final row of the forward positions, who are often referred to as the loose forwards. The three positions in the back row are the two flankers and the number 8. The two flanker positions called the blindside flanker and openside flanker, are the final row in the scrum. They are usually the most mobile forwards in the game. Their main role is to win possession through 'turn overs'. The number 8 packs down between the two locks at the back of the scrum. The role of the number 8 in the scrum is to control the ball after it has been heeled back from the front of the pack, and the position provides a link between the forwards and backs during attacking phases.


title: Rugby union

text: The role of the backs is to create and convert point-scoring opportunities. They are generally smaller, faster and more agile than the forwards. Another distinction between the backs and the forwards is that the backs are expected to have superior kicking and ball-handling skills, especially the fly-half, scrum-half, and full-back.


title: Rugby union

text: The half-backs consist of two positions, the scrum-half and the fly-half also known in the Southern Hemisphere as, half-back and first five-eighth respectively. The fly-half is crucial to a team's game plan, orchestrating the team's performance. They are usually the first to receive the ball from the scrum-half following a breakdown, lineout, or scrum, and need to be decisive with what actions to take and be effective at communicating with the outside backs. Many fly-halves are also their team's goal kickers. The scrum-half is the link between the forwards and the backs. They receive the ball from the lineout and remove the ball from the back of the scrum, usually passing it to the fly-half. They also feed the scrum and sometimes have to act as a fourth loose forward.


title: Rugby union

text: There are four three quarter positions: two centres (inside and outside) and two wings (left and right), the inside centre is commonly referred to as the second five-eighth in the Southern Hemisphere. The centres will attempt to tackle attacking players; whilst in attack, they should employ speed and strength to breach opposition defences. The wings are generally positioned on the outside of the backline. Their primary function is to finish off moves and score tries. Wings are usually the fastest players in the team and are elusive runners who use their speed to avoid tackles.


title: Rugby union

text: The full-back is normally positioned several metres behind the back line. They often field opposition kicks and are usually the last line of defence should an opponent break through the back line. Two of the most important attributes of a good full-back are dependable catching skills and a good kicking game.


title: Rugby union

text: Rugby union is played between two teams – the one that scores more points wins the game. Points can be scored in several ways: a try, scored by grounding the ball in the in-goal area (between the goal line and the dead-ball line), is worth 5 points and a subsequent conversion kick scores 2 points; a successful penalty kick or a drop goal each score 3 points. The values of each of these scoring methods have been changed over the years.


title: Rugby union

text: According to World Rugby's Laws of the Game, a typical rugby ground, formally known as the "playing enclosure", is formed by two major zones:


title: Rugby union

text: The referee (and their assistants) generally have full authority and responsibility for all players and other officials inside the playing enclosure. Fences or ropes (particularly at amateur clubs) are generally used to mark the extent of this area, although in modern stadia this may include the entire arena floor or other designated space.


title: Rugby union

text: The Laws, above all, require that the playing enclosure's surface be safe, whilst also permitting grass, sand, clay, snow or conforming artificial turf to be used; the surface would generally be uniform across both the playing area and perimeter area, although depending on how large the perimeter is, other surfaces such as dirt, artificial turf, etc. may be used outside of a "sliding" perimeter from the bounds of the playing area.


title: Rugby union

text: For the most part, the "playing area" is where the majority of play occurs. The ball is generally considered live whilst in this area, so long as players do not infringe, with special rules applied to specific zones of the playing area.


title: Rugby union

text: A typical "field of play" is generally 100 metres long by 68–70 metres wide for senior rugby, depending on the specific requirements of each ground. The Laws require the field of play to be between 94 metres (103 yards) and 100 metres (109 yards) long, with a width of between 68 metres (75 yards) and 70 metres (77 yards).


title: Rugby union

text: As other football codes, such as association football and rugby league, have specified a preferred or standard 68 metre width, this is often used unless a ground has been specifically designed to accommodate a 70-metre rugby field. 100 metres is the typical length, with a line (see below) often marked at halfway with "50" on it, representing 50 metres from each goal line. The variations have been allowed in the Laws, possibly to accommodate older grounds (perhaps even pre-metrification when yards and feet were specified) and developing nations.


title: Rugby union

text: The field of play is divided by a solid "halfway" line, drawn perpendicular to the sidelines at their midpoint. A 0.5m line is marked perpendicular to the halfway lines at its midpoint, designating the spot where the kickoffs shall be taken. The areas between each goal line and the halfway line are known as "halves" as in other football codes.


title: Rugby union

text: A pair of solid lines are also drawn perpendicular to the sidelines, 22 metres (formerly 25 yards) from each end of the field of play and called the 22-metre lines, or "22"s. An area at each end, also known as the "22", is bounded by, but does not include, the sidelines, goal line and 22-metre line. In this area, a defensive player who cleanly catches a ball kicked by the other team, without the ball having already touched the ground after the kick, is entitled to claim a free kick, or "mark".


title: Rugby union

text: Additional broken or dashed lines (of 5 metre dash lengths, according to the Laws) are drawn in each half or on each side of, the field, each with specific purposes under the Laws:


title: Rugby union

text: Generally, points where the dashed lines intersect other lines will be marked with a "T" or cross shape, although the extensions of dashed lines are generally not drawn within 5 metres of the goal lines or sidelines, to allow a clear demarcation of the field of play's boundaries.


title: Rugby union

text: The Laws require the playing area to be rectangular in shape, however variations may be permitted with the approval of relevant unions. A notable example is Chatswood Oval in Sydney, Australia, an elliptically shaped cricket ground which is the home of Gordon rugby club, that has curved dead-ball lines to maximise the available in-goal space.


title: Rugby union

text: Where multiple sports share a field (e.g. a rugby league and a rugby union club sharing one field), lines may be overlaid on top of each other, sometimes in different colours. However, particularly for television, rugby union line markings are generally painted white. Some exceptions include the Wallabies (Australia's national team) who often have yellow markings. Local clubs may use black, yellow, or other colours on grass, with other surfaces possibly requiring different marking techniques.


title: Rugby union

text: Unlike association football, where on-field advertising is strictly forbidden in the laws, World Rugby allows sponsors logos to be painted on the playing surface. This is another way in which clubs can make money in the professional era and is also often used by host nations, professional leagues and tournaments as additional revenue streams, particularly when games are broadcast. In recent years, augmented reality technology has been used to replace painting to protect the surface or save costs on painting fields, producing a similar effect for broadcast albeit sometimes with poorer results.


title: Rugby union

text: The in-goal areas sit behind the goal lines, equivalent to American football's "end zones". The in-goal areas must be between 6 metres (7 yards) and 22 metres (25 yards) deep and cover the full width of the field. A ball grounded in this area by an attacking player will generally result in a try being awarded, unless there has been a previous infringement or the player has gone out-of-bounds whilst in possession of the ball.


title: Rugby union

text: The perimeter area is considered "out-of-bounds" for the ball and the players, normally resulting in the non-infringing team receiving possession of the ball at a restart. The perimeter area can be divided into two areas:


title: Rugby union

text: For the purposes of determining if a ball is "out-of-bounds" (i.e. has left the playing area), the perimeter area extends indefinitely away from the playing area.


title: Rugby union

text: When a ball or player goes into touch, a lineout throw is generally awarded to the opposition at the spot on the sideline where they left the field. Exceptions include a kick out "on the full" (i.e. the ball did not land in the field-of-play before going into touch) in which case the lineout would still take place on the sideline but back in line with where the ball was kicked, or when a team takes a free kick from a penalty where they would retain the right to throw-in.


title: Rugby union

text: The perimeter area should be clear and free of obstructions and heavy, solid objects which could pose a danger to players for at least 5 metres from the playing area, according to the Laws. Players often leave the playing area whether accidentally or due to being forced off of the field, sometimes sliding or needing to slow down from a sprint. Many venues at elite levels leave larger spaces around the field to accommodate fitter and faster (or heavier) players. Fixed cameras on tripods and advertising hoardings are often the main culprits for injuring players in the perimeter area.


title: Rugby union

text: Also required in the perimeter area are a set of 14 flag posts, each with a minimum height of 1.2 metres, marking the intersections of certain lines or other nominated distances. These are generally a plastic pole on a spring loaded or otherwise soft base, sometimes with a flag on top, covered in foam padding. Others may be moulded plastic or disposable cardboard. At lower levels, these flags may not be used, but are still specified in the Laws. Flags are placed as follows:


title: Rugby union

text: Rugby goalposts are H-shaped and are situated in the middle of the goal lines at each end of the field. They consist of two vertical poles (known as "uprights"), generally made of steel or other metal but sometimes wood or a plastic, apart, connected by a horizontal "crossbar" above the ground. The minimum height for posts' uprights is , with taller posts generally seen. The bottom parts of each upright are generally wrapped in purpose-made padding to protect players from injury when coming into contact with the posts and creating another opportunity for sponsors. If an attacking player grounds the ball onto the base of the upright or post padding, a try will be awarded as the base of the upright is considered in-goal.


title: Rugby union

text: At the beginning of the game, the captains and the referee toss a coin to decide which team will kick off first. Play then starts with a dropkick, with the players chasing the ball into the opposition's territory, and the other side trying to retrieve the ball and advance it. The dropkick must make contact with the ground before kicked. If the ball does not reach the opponent's line 10 meters away, the opposing team has two choices: to have the ball kicked off again, or to have a scrum at the centre of the half-way line.


title: Rugby union

text: Games are divided into 40-minute halves, with an intermission of not more than 15 minutes in the middle. The sides exchange ends of the field after the half-time break. Stoppages for injury or to allow the referee to take disciplinary action do not count as part of the playing time, so that the elapsed time is usually longer than 80 minutes. The referee is responsible for keeping time, even when—as in many professional tournaments—he is assisted by an official time-keeper. If time expires while the ball is in play, the game continues until the ball is "dead", and only then will the referee blow the whistle to signal half-time or full-time; but if the referee awards a penalty or free-kick, the game continues.


title: Rugby union

text: In the knockout stages of rugby competitions, most notably the Rugby World Cup, two extra time periods of 10 minutes periods are played (with an interval of 5 minutes in between) if the game is tied after full-time. If scores are level after 100 minutes then the rules call for 20 minutes of sudden-death extra time to be played. If the sudden-death extra time period results in no scoring a kicking competition is used to determine the winner. However, no match in the history of the Rugby World Cup has ever gone past 100 minutes into a sudden-death extra time period.


title: Rugby union

text: Forward passing (throwing the ball ahead to another player) is not allowed; the ball can be passed laterally or backwards. The ball tends to be moved forward in three ways—by kicking, by a player running with it or within a scrum or maul. Only the player with the ball may be tackled or rucked. A "knock-on" is committed when a player knocks the ball forward, and play is restarted with a scrum.


title: Rugby union

text: Any player may kick the ball forward in an attempt to gain territory. When a player anywhere in the playing area kicks indirectly into touch so that the ball first bounces in the field of play, the throw-in is taken where the ball went into touch. If the player kicks directly into touch (i.e. without bouncing in-field first) from within one's own line, the lineout is taken by the opposition where the ball went into touch, but if the ball is kicked into touch directly by a player outside the line, the lineout is taken level to where the kick was taken.


title: Rugby union

text: The aim of the defending side is to stop the player with the ball, either by bringing them to ground (a tackle, which is frequently followed by a ruck) or by contesting for possession with the ball-carrier on their feet (a maul). Such a circumstance is called a breakdown and each is governed by a specific law.


title: Rugby union

text: A player may tackle an opposing player who has the ball by holding them while bringing them to ground. Tacklers cannot tackle above the shoulder (the neck and head are out of bounds), and the tackler has to attempt to wrap their arms around the player being tackled to complete the tackle. It is illegal to push, shoulder-charge, or to trip a player using feet or legs, but hands may be used (this being referred to as a tap-tackle or ankle-tap). Tacklers may not tackle an opponent who has jumped to catch a ball until the player has landed.


title: Rugby union

text: Mauls occur after a player with the ball has come into contact with an opponent but the handler remains on his feet; once any combination of at least three players have bound themselves a maul has been set. A ruck is similar to the maul, but in this case the ball has gone to ground with at least three attacking players binding themselves on the ground in an attempt to secure the ball.


title: Rugby union

text: When the ball leaves the side of the field, a line-out is awarded against the team which last touched the ball. Forward players from each team line up a metre apart, perpendicular to the touchline and between from the touchline. The ball is thrown from the touchline down the centre of the lines of forwards by a player (usually the hooker) from the team that did not play the ball into touch. The exception to this is when the ball went out from a penalty, in which case the side who gained the penalty throws the ball in.


title: Rugby union

text: Both sides compete for the ball and players may lift their teammates. A jumping player cannot be tackled until they stand and only shoulder-to-shoulder contact is allowed; deliberate infringement of this law is dangerous play, and results in a penalty kick.


title: Rugby union

text: A scrum is a way of restarting the game safely and fairly after a minor infringement. It is awarded when the ball has been knocked or passed forward, if a player takes the ball over their own try line and puts the ball down, when a player is accidentally offside or when the ball is trapped in a ruck or maul with no realistic chance of being retrieved. A team may also opt for a scrum if awarded a penalty.


title: Rugby union

text: A scrum is formed by the eight forwards from each team crouching down and binding together in three rows, before interlocking with the opposing team. For each team, the front row consists of two props (loosehead and tighthead) either side of the hooker. The two props are typically amongst the strongest players on the team. The second row consists of two locks and the two flankers. Behind the second row is the number 8. This formation is known as the 3–4–1 formation. Once a scrum is formed the scrum-half from the team awarded the "feed" rolls the ball into the gap between the two front-rows known as the "tunnel". The two hookers then compete for possession by hooking the ball backwards with their feet, while each pack tries to push the opposing pack backwards to help gain possession. The side that wins possession can either keep the ball under their feet while driving the opposition back, in order to gain ground, or transfer the ball to the back of the scrum where it can be picked up by the number 8 or by the scrum-half.


title: Rugby union

text: There are three match officials: a referee, and two assistant referees. The referees are commonly addressed as "Sir". The latter, formerly known as touch judges, had the primary function of indicating when the ball had gone into "touch"; their role has been expanded and they are now expected to assist the referee in a number of areas, such as watching for foul play and checking offside lines. In addition, for matches in high level competitions, there is often a television match official (TMO; popularly called the "video referee"), to assist with certain decisions, linked up to the referee by radio. The referees have a system of hand signals to indicate their decision.


title: Rugby union

text: Common offences include tackling above the shoulders, collapsing a scrum, ruck or maul, not releasing the ball when on the ground, or being offside. The non-offending team has a number of options when awarded a penalty: a "tap" kick, when the ball is kicked a very short distance from hand, allowing the kicker to regather the ball and run with it; a punt, when the ball is kicked a long distance from hand, for field position; a place-kick, when the kicker will attempt to score a goal; or a scrum. Players may be sent off (signalled by a red card) or temporarily suspended ("sin-binned") for ten minutes (yellow card) for foul play or repeated infringements, and may not be replaced.


title: Rugby union

text: Occasionally, infringements are not caught by the referee during the match and these may be "cited" by the citing commissioner after the match and have punishments (usually suspension for a number of weeks) imposed on the infringing player.


title: Rugby union

text: During the match, players may be replaced (for injury) or substituted (for tactical reasons). A player who has been replaced may not rejoin play unless he was temporarily replaced to have bleeding controlled; a player who has been substituted may return temporarily, to replace a player who has a blood injury or has suffered a concussion, or permanently, if he is replacing a front-row forward. In international matches, eight replacements are allowed; in domestic or cross-border tournaments, at the discretion of the responsible national union(s), the number of replacements may be nominated to a maximum of eight, of whom three must be sufficiently trained and experienced to provide cover for the three front row positions.


title: Rugby union

text: Prior to 2016, all substitutions, no matter the cause, counted against the limit during a match. In 2016, World Rugby changed the law so that substitutions made to replace a player deemed unable to continue due to foul play by the opposition would no longer count against the match limit. This change was introduced in January of that year in the Southern Hemisphere and June in the Northern Hemisphere.


title: Rugby union

text: The most basic items of equipment for a game of rugby union are the ball itself, a rugby shirt (also known as a "jersey"), rugby shorts, socks, and boots. The rugby ball is oval in shape (technically a prolate spheroid), and is made up of four panels. The ball was historically made of leather, but in the modern era most games use a ball made from a synthetic material. World Rugby lays out specific dimensions for the ball, in length, in circumference of length and in circumference of width. Rugby boots have soles with studs to allow grip on the turf of the pitch. The studs may be either metal or plastic but must not have any sharp edges or ridges.


title: Rugby union

text: Protective equipment is optional and strictly regulated. The most common items are mouthguards, which are worn by almost all players, and are compulsory in some rugby-playing nations. Other protective items that are permitted include headgear; thin (not more than 10 mm thick), non-rigid shoulder pads and shin guards; which are worn underneath socks. Bandages or tape can be worn to support or protect injuries; some players wear tape around the head to protect the ears in scrums and rucks. Female players may also wear chest pads. Although not worn for protection, some types of fingerless mitts are allowed to aid grip.


title: Rugby union

text: It is the responsibility of the match officials to check players' clothing and equipment before a game to ensure that it conforms to the laws of the game.


title: Rugby union

text: The international governing body of rugby union (and associated games such as sevens) is World Rugby (WR). The WR headquarters are in Dublin, Ireland. WR, founded in 1886, governs the sport worldwide and publishes the game's laws and rankings. As of February 2014, WR (then known as the IRB, for International Rugby Board) recorded 119 unions in its membership, 101 full members and 18 associate member countries. According to WR, rugby union is played by men and women in over 100 countries. WR controls the Rugby World Cup, the Women's Rugby World Cup, Rugby World Cup Sevens, HSBC Sevens Series, HSBC Women's Sevens Series, World Under 20 Championship, World Under 20 Trophy, Nations Cup and the Pacific Nations Cup. WR holds votes to decide where each of these events are to be held, except in the case of the Sevens World Series for men and women, for which WR contracts with several national unions to hold individual events.


title: Rugby union

text: Six regional associations, which are members of WR, form the next level of administration; these are:


title: Rugby union

text: SANZAAR (South Africa, New Zealand, Australia and Argentina Rugby) is a joint venture of the South African Rugby Union, New Zealand Rugby, Rugby Australia and the Argentine Rugby Union (UAR) that operates Super Rugby and The Rugby Championship (formerly the Tri Nations before the entry of Argentina). Although UAR initially had no representation on the former SANZAR board, it was granted input into the organisation's issues, especially with regard to The Rugby Championship, and became a full SANZAAR member in 2016 (when the country entered Super Rugby).


title: Rugby union

text: National unions oversee rugby union within individual countries and are affiliated to WR. Since 2016, the WR Council has 40 seats. A total of 11 unions—the eight foundation unions of England, Scotland, Ireland, Wales, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and France, plus Argentina, and —have two seats each. In addition, the six regional associations have two seats each. Four more unions—, , and the USA—have one seat each. Finally, the chairman and Vice Chairman, who usually come from one of the eight foundation unions (although the current Vice Chairman, Agustín Pichot, is with the non-foundation Argentine union) have one vote each.


title: Rugby union

text: The earliest countries to adopt rugby union were England, the country of inception, and the other three Home Nations, Scotland, Ireland and Wales. The spread of rugby union as a global sport has its roots in the exporting of the game by British expatriates, military personnel, and overseas university students.


title: Rugby union

text: The first rugby club in France was formed by British residents in Le Havre in 1872, while the next year Argentina recorded its first game: 'Banks' v 'City' in Buenos Aires.


title: Rugby union

text: Seven countries have adopted rugby union as their de facto national sport; they are Fiji, Georgia, Madagascar, New Zealand, Samoa, Tonga and Wales.


title: Rugby union

text: A rugby club was formed in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia in 1864; while the sport was said to have been introduced to New Zealand by Charles Monro in 1870, who played rugby while a student at Christ's College, Finchley.


title: Rugby union

text: Several island nations have embraced the sport of rugby. Rugby was first played in Fiji circa 1884 by European and Fijian soldiers of the Native Constabulary at Ba on Viti Levu island. Fiji then sent their first overseas team to Samoa in 1924, who in turn set up their own union in 1924. Along with Tonga, other countries to have national rugby teams in Oceania include the Cook Islands, Niue, Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands.


title: Rugby union

text: In North America a club formed in Montreal in 1868, Canada's first club. The city of Montreal also played its part in the introduction of the sport in the United States, when students of McGill University played against a team from Harvard University in 1874. The two variants of gridiron football — Canadian football and, to a lesser extent, American football — were once considered forms of rugby football but are seldom now referred to as such. In fact, the governing body of Canadian football, Football Canada, was known as the Canadian Rugby Union (CRU) as late as 1967, more than fifty years after the sport parted ways with the established rules of rugby union. The Grey Cup, the trophy awarded to the victorious team playing in the namesake championship of the professional Canadian Football League (CFL), was originally awarded to the champion of the CRU. The two strongest leagues in the CRU, the Interprovincial Rugby Football Union in Eastern Canada and the Western Interprovincial Football Union in Western Canada, evolved into the present day CFL.


title: Rugby union

text: Although the exact date of arrival of rugby union in Trinidad and Tobago is unknown, their first club Northern RFC was formed in 1923, a national team was playing by 1927 and due to a cancelled tour to British Guiana in 1933, switched their venue to Barbados; introducing rugby to the island. Other Atlantic countries to play rugby union include Jamaica and Bermuda.


title: Rugby union

text: The growth of rugby union in Europe outside the 6 Nations countries in terms of playing numbers, attendances, and viewership has been sporadic. Historically, British and Irish home teams played the Southern Hemisphere teams of Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa, as well as France. The rest of Europe were left to play amongst themselves. During a period when it had been isolated by the British and Irish Unions, France, lacking international competition, became the only European team from the top tier to regularly play the other European countries; mainly Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, Spain, Romania, Poland, Italy and Czechoslovakia. In 1934, instigated by the French Rugby Federation, FIRA (Fédération Internationale de Rugby Amateur) was formed to organise rugby union outside the authority of the IRFB. The founding members were , , , , , and .


title: Rugby union

text: Other European rugby playing nations of note include Russia, whose first officially recorded match is marked by an encounter between Dynamo Moscow and the Moscow Institute of Physical Education in 1933. Rugby union in Portugal also took hold between the First and Second World Wars, with a Portuguese National XV set up in 1922 and an official championship started in 1927.


title: Rugby union

text: In 1999, FIRA agreed to place itself under the auspices of the IRB, transforming itself into a strictly European organising body. Accordingly, it changed its name to FIRA–AER (Fédération Internationale de Rugby Amateur – Association Européenne de Rugby). It adopted its current name of Rugby Europe in 2014.


title: Rugby union

text: Although Argentina is the best-known rugby playing nation in South America, founding the Argentine Rugby Union in 1899, several other countries on the continent have a long history. Rugby had been played in Brazil since the end of the 19th century, but the game was played regularly only from 1926, when São Paulo beat Santos in an inter-city match. It took Uruguay several aborted attempts to adapt to rugby, led mainly by the efforts of the Montevideo Cricket Club; these efforts succeeded in 1951 with the formation of a national league and four clubs. Other South American countries that formed a rugby union include Chile (1948), and Paraguay (1968).


title: Rugby union

text: Many Asian countries have a tradition of playing rugby dating from the British Empire. India began playing rugby in the early 1870s, the Calcutta Football Club forming in 1873. However, with the departure of a local British army regiment, interest in rugby diminished in the area. In 1878, The Calcutta Football Club was disbanded, and rugby in India faltered. Sri Lanka claims to have founded their union in 1878, and although little official information from the period is available, the team won the All-India cup in Madras in 1920. The first recorded match in Malaysia was in 1892, but the first confirmation of rugby is the existence of the "HMS Malaya Cup" which was first presented in 1922 and is still awarded to the winners of the Malay sevens.


title: Rugby union

text: Rugby union was introduced to Japan in 1899 by two Cambridge students: Ginnosuke Tanaka and Edward Bramwell Clarke. The Japan RFU was founded in 1926 and its place in rugby history was cemented when Japan hosted the 2019 World Cup. It was the first country outside the Commonwealth, Ireland and France to host the event, and was viewed by the IRB as an opportunity for rugby union to extend its reach, particularly in Asia. Other Asian playing countries of note include Singapore, South Korea, China and The Philippines, while the former British colony of Hong Kong is notable within rugby for its development of the rugby sevens game, especially the Hong Kong Sevens tournament which was founded in 1976.


title: Rugby union

text: Rugby in the Middle East and the Gulf States has its history in the 1950s, with clubs formed by British and French Services stationed in the region after the Second World War. When these servicemen left, the clubs and teams were kept alive by young professionals, mostly Europeans, working in these countries. The official union of Oman was formed in 1971. Bahrain founded its union a year later, while in 1975 the Dubai Sevens, the Gulf's leading rugby tournament, was created. Rugby remains a minority sport in the region with Israel and the United Arab Emirates, as of 2019, being the only member union from the Middle East to be included in the IRB World Rankings.


title: Rugby union

text: In 1875, rugby was introduced to South Africa by British soldiers garrisoned in Cape Town. The game spread quickly across the country, displacing Winchester College football as the sport of choice in South Africa and spreading to nearby Zimbabwe. South African settlers also brought the game with them to Namibia and competed against British administrators in British East Africa. During the late 19th and early 20th century, the sport in Africa was spread by settlers and colonials who often adopted a "whites-only" policy to playing the game. This resulted in rugby being viewed as a bourgeois sport by the indigenous people with limited appeal. Despite this enclaves of black participation developed notably in the Eastern Cape and in Harare. The earliest countries to see the playing of competitive rugby include South Africa, and neighbouring Rhodesia (modern-day Zimbabwe), which formed the Rhodesia Rugby Football Union in 1895 and became a regular stop for touring British and New Zealand sides.


title: Rugby union

text: In more recent times the sport has been embraced by several African nations. In the early 21st century Madagascar has experienced crowds of 40,000 at national matches, while Namibia, whose history of rugby can be dated from 1915, have qualified for the final stages of the World Cup four times since 1999. Other African nations to be represented in the World Rugby Rankings as Member Unions include Côte d'Ivoire, Kenya, Uganda and Zambia. South Africa and Kenya are among the 15 "core teams" that participate in every event of the men's World Rugby Sevens Series.


title: Rugby union

text: Records of women's rugby football date from the late 19th century, with the first documented source being Emily Valentine's writings, in which she states that she set up a rugby team in Portora Royal School in Enniskillen, Ireland in 1887. Although there are reports of early women's matches in New Zealand and France, one of the first notable games to prove primary evidence was the 1917 war-time encounter between Cardiff Ladies and Newport Ladies; a photo of which shows the Cardiff team before the match at the Cardiff Arms Park. Since the 1980s, the game has grown in popularity among female athletes, and by 2010, according to World Rugby, women's rugby was being played in over 100 countries.


title: Rugby union

text: The English-based Women's Rugby Football Union (WRFU), responsible for women's rugby in England, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales, was founded in 1983, and is the oldest formally organised national governing body for women's rugby. This was replaced in 1994 by the Rugby Football Union for Women (RFUW) in England with each of the other Home Nations governing their own countries.


title: Rugby union

text: The premier international competition in rugby union for women is the Women's Rugby World Cup, first held in 1991; from 1994 through 2014, it was held every four years. After the 2014 event, the tournament was brought forward a year to 2017 to avoid clashing with other sporting cycles, in particular the Rugby World Cup Sevens competition. The Women's Rugby World Cup returned to a four-year cycle after 2017, with future competitions to be held in the middle year of the men's World Cup cycle.


title: Rugby union

text: The most important competition in rugby union is the Rugby World Cup, a men's tournament that has taken place every four years since the inaugural event in 1987. South Africa are the reigning champions, having defeated England in the final of the 2019 Rugby World Cup in Yokohama. New Zealand and South Africa have each won the title three times (New Zealand: 1987, 2011, 2015; South Africa: 1995, 2007, 2019), Australia have won twice (1991 and 1999), and England once (2003). England is the only team from the Northern Hemisphere to have won the Rugby World Cup.


title: Rugby union

text: The Rugby World Cup has continued to grow since its inception in 1987. The Rugby League World Cup dates from 1954 in contrast. The first tournament, in which 16 teams competed for the title, was broadcast to 17 countries with an accumulated total of 230 million television viewers. Ticket sales during the pool stages and finals of the same tournament was less than a million. The 2007 World Cup was contested by 94 countries with ticket sales of 3,850,000 over the pool and final stage. The accumulated television audience for the event, then broadcast to 200 countries, was a claimed 4.2 billion.


title: Rugby union

text: The 2019 Rugby World Cup took place in Japan between 20 September and 2 November. It was the ninth edition and the first time the tournament has been held in Asia.


title: Rugby union

text: Major international competitions are the Six Nations Championship and The Rugby Championship, held in Europe and the Southern Hemisphere respectively.


title: Rugby union

text: The Six Nations is an annual competition involving the European teams , , , , and . Each country plays the other five once. Following the first internationals between England and Scotland, Ireland and Wales began competing in the 1880s, forming the "Home International Championships". France joined the tournament in the 1900s and in 1910 the term "Five Nations" first appeared. However, the Home Nations (England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales) excluded France in 1931 amid a run of poor results, allegations of professionalism and concerns over on-field violence. France then rejoined in 1939–1940, though World War II halted proceedings for a further eight years. France has played in all the tournaments since WWII, the first of which was played in 1947. In 2000, Italy became the sixth nation in the contest and Rome's Stadio Olimpico has replaced Stadio Flaminio as the venue for their home games since 2013.


title: Rugby union

text: The Rugby Championship is the Southern Hemisphere's annual international series for that region's top national teams. From its inception in 1996 through 2011, it was known as the Tri Nations, as it featured the hemisphere's traditional powers of Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. These teams have dominated world rankings in recent years, and many considered the Tri Nations to be the toughest competition in international rugby. The Tri Nations was initially played on a home and away basis with the three nations playing each other twice.


title: Rugby union

text: In 2006 a new system was introduced where each nation plays the others three times, though in 2007 and 2011 the teams played each other only twice, as both were World Cup years. Since Argentina's strong performances in the 2007 World Cup, after the 2009 Tri Nations tournament, SANZAR (South Africa, New Zealand and Australian Rugby) invited the Argentine Rugby Union (UAR) to join an expanded Four Nations tournament in 2012. The competition has been officially rechristened as The Rugby Championship beginning with the 2012 edition. The competition reverted to the Tri Nations' original home-and-away format, but now involving four teams. In World Cup years, an abbreviated tournament is held in which each team plays the others only once. In 2020, the "Tri Nations" format was temporarily revived due to the withdrawal of South Africa owing to the COVID-19 pandemic.


title: Rugby union

text: Rugby union was played at the Olympic Games in 1900, 1908, 1920 and 1924. As per Olympic rules, the nations of Scotland, Wales and England were not allowed to play separately as they are not sovereign states. In 1900, France won the gold, beating Great Britain 27 points to 8 and defeating Germany 27 points to 17. In 1908, Australia defeated Great Britain, claiming the gold medal, the score being 32 points to three. In 1920, the United States, fielding a team with many players new to the sport of rugby, upset France in a shock win, eight points to zero. In 1924, the United States again defeated France 17 to 3, becoming the only team to win gold twice in the sport.


title: Rugby union

text: In 2009 the International Olympic Committee voted with a majority of 81 to 8 that rugby union be reinstated as an Olympic sport in at least the 2016 and 2020 games, but in the sevens, 4-day tournament format. This is something the rugby world has aspired to for a long time and Bernard Lapasset, president of the International Rugby Board, said the Olympic gold medal would be considered to be "the pinnacle of our sport" (Rugby Sevens).


title: Rugby union

text: Rugby sevens has been played at the Commonwealth Games since the 1998 Games in Kuala Lumpur. The most gold medal holders are New Zealand who have won the competition on four successive occasions until South Africa beat them in 2014. Rugby union has also been an Asian Games event since the 1998 games in Bangkok, Thailand. In the 1998 and 2002 editions of the games, both the usual fifteen-a-side variety and rugby sevens were played, but from 2006 onwards, only rugby sevens was retained. In 2010, the women's rugby sevens event was introduced. The event is likely to remain a permanent fixture of the Asian Games due to elevation of rugby sevens as an Olympic sport from the 2016 Olympics onwards. The present gold medal holders in the sevens tournament, held in 2014, are Japan in the men's event and China in the women's.


title: Rugby union

text: Women's international rugby union began in 1982, with a match between France and the Netherlands played in Utrecht. As of 2009 over six hundred women's internationals have been played by over forty different nations.


title: Rugby union

text: The first Women's Rugby World Cup was held in Wales in 1991, and was won by the United States. The second tournament took place in 1994, and from that time through 2014 was held every four years. The New Zealand Women's team then won four straight World Cups (1998, 2002, 2006, 2010) before England won in 2014. Following the 2014 event, World Rugby moved the next edition of the event to 2017, with a new four-year cycle from that point forward. New Zealand are the current World Cup holders.


title: Rugby union

text: As well as the Women's Rugby World Cup there are also other regular tournaments, including a Six Nations, run in parallel to the men's competition. The Women's Six Nations, first played in 1996 has been dominated by England, who have won the tournament on 14 occasions, including a run of seven consecutive wins from 2006 to 2012. However, since then, England have won only in 2017; reigning champion France have won in each even-numbered year (2014, 2016, 2018) whilst Ireland won in 2013 and 2015.


title: Rugby union

text: Rugby union has been professionalised since 1995. The following table shows professional and semi-professional rugby union competitions.


title: Rugby union

text: Rugby union has spawned several variants of the full-contact, 15-a-side game. The two most common differences in adapted versions are fewer players and reduced player contact.


title: Rugby union

text: The oldest variant is rugby sevens (sometimes 7s or VIIs), a fast-paced game which originated in Melrose, Scotland in 1883. In rugby sevens, there are only seven players per side, and each half is normally seven minutes. Major tournaments include the Hong Kong Sevens and Dubai Sevens, both held in areas not normally associated with the highest levels of the 15-a-side game.


title: Rugby union

text: A more recent variant of the sport is rugby tens (10s or Xs), a Malaysian invention with ten players per side.


title: Rugby union

text: Touch rugby, in which "tackles" are made by simply touching the ball carrier with two hands, is popular both as a training game and more formally as a mixed sex version of the sport played by both children and adults.


title: Rugby union

text: Several variants have been created to introduce the sport to children with a less physical contact. Mini rugby is a version aimed at fostering the sport in children. It is played with only eight players and on a smaller pitch.


title: Rugby union

text: Tag Rugby is a version in which the players wear a belt with two tags attached by velcro, the removal of either counting as a 'tackle'. Tag Rugby also varies in that kicking the ball is not allowed. Similar to Tag Rugby, American Flag Rugby, (AFR), is a mixed gender, non-contact imitation of rugby union designed for American children entering grades K-9. Both American Flag Rugby and Mini Rugby differ from Tag Rugby in that they introduce more advanced elements of rugby union as the participants age.


title: Rugby union

text: Rugby league was formed after the Northern Union broke from the Rugby Football Union in a disagreement over payment to players. It went on to change its laws and became a football code in its own right. The two sports continue to influence each other to this day.


title: Rugby union

text: Australian rules football was influenced by rugby football and other games originating in English public schools.


title: Rugby union

text: James Naismith took aspects of many sports including rugby to invent basketball. The most obvious contribution is the jump ball's similarity to the line-out as well as the underhand shooting style that dominated the early years of the sport. Naismith played rugby at McGill University.


title: Rugby union

text: Rugby lends its name to wheelchair rugby, a full-contact sport which contains elements of rugby such as crossing a try line with the ball to score.


title: Rugby union

text: According to a 2011 report by the Centre for the International Business of Sport, over four and a half million people play rugby union or one of its variants organised by the IRB. This is an increase of 19 percent since the previous report in 2007. The report also claimed that since 2007 participation has grown by 33 percent in Africa, 22 percent in South America and 18 percent in Asia and North America. In 2014 the IRB published a breakdown of the total number of players worldwide by national unions. It recorded a total of 6.6 million players globally, of those, 2.36 million were registered members playing for a club affiliated to their country's union. The 2016 World Rugby Year in Review reported 8.5 million players, of which 3.2 million were registered union players and 1.9 million were registered club players; 22% of all players were female.


title: Rugby union

text: The most capped international player from the tier 1 nations is Welsh captain Alun Wyn Jones who has played over 150 internationals.


title: Rugby union

text: While the top scoring tier 1 international player is New Zealand's Dan Carter, who has amassed 1442 points during his career. In April 2010 Lithuania which is a second tier rugby nation, broke the record of consecutive international wins for second tier rugby nations. In 2016, the All Blacks of New Zealand set the new record 18 consecutive test wins among tier 1 rugby nations, bettering their previous consecutive run of 17. This record was equalled by England on 11 March 2017 with a win over Scotland at Twickenham. The highest scoring international match between two recognised unions was Hong Kong's 164–13 victory over Singapore on 27 October 1994. While the largest winning margin of 152 points is held by two countries, Japan (a 155–3 win over Chinese Taipei) and Argentina (152–0 over Paraguay) both in 2002.


title: Rugby union

text: The record attendance for a rugby union game was set on 15 July 2000 in which New Zealand defeated Australia 39–35 in a Bledisloe Cup game at Stadium Australia in Sydney before 109,874 fans. The record attendance for a match in Europe of 104,000 (at the time a world record) was set on 1 March 1975 when Scotland defeated Wales 12–10 at Murrayfield in Edinburgh during the 1975 Five Nations Championship. This crowd however is an estimate and contemporaneous newspaper accounts list a crowd of 80,000 only. The record attendance for a domestic club match is 99,124, set when Racing 92 defeated Toulon in the 2016 Top 14 final on 24 June at Camp Nou in Barcelona. The match had been moved from its normal site of Stade de France near Paris due to scheduling conflicts with France's hosting of UEFA Euro 2016.


title: Rugby union

text: Thomas Hughes 1857 novel "Tom Brown's Schooldays", set at Rugby School, includes a rugby football match, also portrayed in the 1940s film of the same name. James Joyce mentions Irish team Bective Rangers in several of his works, including "Ulysses" (1922) and "Finnegans Wake" (1939), while his 1916 semi-autobiographical work "A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man" has an account of Ireland international James Magee. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, in his 1924 Sherlock Holmes tale "The Adventure of the Sussex Vampire", mentions that Dr Watson played rugby for Blackheath.


title: Rugby union

text: Henri Rousseau's 1908 work "Joueurs de football" shows two pairs of rugby players competing. Other French artists to have represented the sport in their works include Albert Gleizes' "Les Joueurs de football" (1912), Robert Delaunay's "Football. L'Équipe de Cardiff" (1916) and André Lhote's "Partie de Rugby" (1917). The 1928 Gold Medal for Art at the Amsterdam Olympics was won by Luxembourg's Jean Jacoby for his work "Rugby".


title: Rugby union

text: In film, Ealing Studios' 1949 comedy "A Run for Your Money" and the 1979 BBC Wales television film "Grand Slam" both centre on fans attending a match. Films that explore the sport in more detail include independent production "Old Scores" (1991) and "Forever Strong" (2008). "Invictus" (2009), based on John Carlin's book "Playing the Enemy", explores the events of the 1995 Rugby World Cup and Nelson Mandela's attempt to use the sport to connect South Africa's people post-apartheid.


title: Rugby union

text: In public art and sculpture there are many works dedicated to the sport. There is a bronze statue of a rugby line-out by pop artist Gerald Laing at Twickenham and one of rugby administrator Sir Tasker Watkins at the Millennium Stadium. Rugby players to have been honoured with statues include Gareth Edwards in Cardiff and Danie Craven in Stellenbosch.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: Boban Marjanović (; born August 15, 1988) is a Serbian professional basketball player for the Houston Rockets of the National Basketball Association (NBA). He also plays for the Serbian national basketball team in international competitions. In 2015, he earned an All-EuroLeague First Team selection. He is also an actor, having appeared in several films.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: Marjanović was born and raised in Boljevac in eastern Serbia. Although he was tall from a young age, his family members are all of average height: his father stands only tall. A pituitary gland condition is thought to have contributed to his gigantism.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: Marjanović began playing basketball with the youth teams of Boljevac-based club Rtanj. By age 14 he was tall, and began playing for the Serbian professional team Hemofarm. He played in their youth categories until the 2005–06 season.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: Marjanović joined Hemofarm's first team, playing in the Adriatic League, in the second half of the 2005–06 season. He played there until January 2007 when he was loaned to the Serbian League team Swisslion Takovo. After half a season there, he returned to Hemofarm. His teammates included Stefan Marković and Milan Mačvan, with whom he had played on the Serbian junior national team.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: In the summer of 2010, Marjanović signed a three-year contract with CSKA Moscow, on the insistence of Duško Vujošević. After Vujošević was fired, Marjanović lost his place in CSKA's first team. On December 31, 2010, he was loaned to Žalgiris, until the end of the 2010–11 season.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: In July 2011, he signed for Nizhny Novgorod, staying there for half a season. In January 2012, he returned to Serbia and signed for Radnički Kragujevac on loan for the rest of the 2011–12 season.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: In July 2012, Marjanović signed a contract with Serbian team Mega Vizura for the 2012–13 season. He was named the MVP of the Serbian League.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: On July 2, 2013, Marjanović signed a two-year contract with Crvena zvezda. In December 2013, he was named EuroLeague MVP of the Round for Round 10. In April 2014, along with his teammate DeMarcus Nelson, he was selected for the Ideal Team for the 2013–14 ABA League season.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: In the first game of the 2014–15 EuroLeague season, Marjanović led his team to a 76–68 victory against Galatasaray, scoring 22 points and pulling down 10 rebounds in 28 minutes on the court. He was later named the EuroLeague MVP of the Round for Round 1. On November 22, 2014, he recorded 23 points and a career-high 17 rebounds, for a total index rating of 39 in a double overtime 103–110 loss against Galatasaray. At the time, his 17 rebounds in a single game was the highest number by any player in the EuroLeague since 2011–12.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: On April 9, in a game against Panathinaikos, he set the EuroLeague record since the 2000–01 season for the most rebounds in a single season with 256, passing the previous record of Mirsad Türkcan, who had 248 rebounds in the 2002–03 season. He also set the EuroLeague record for the most double-doubles in a season with 16, surpassing the record of 14 set by Tanoka Beard in the 2004–05 season. Over 24 EuroLeague games, he averaged all career-highs of 16.6 points, a league-leading 10.7 rebounds and a record (since the EuroLeague 2000–01 season) of 25.67 in PIR.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: On April 2, 2015, he was selected for the Ideal Team for the 2014–15 ABA League season. Later that month, he helped his team to win the 2014–15 ABA League trophy. He was named the MVP of the ABA League playoffs. In May 2015, he was chosen for the All-EuroLeague First Team.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: On June 5, 2015, Marjanović was named the Serbian Super League MVP for the third consecutive season, having helped his team to reach first place in the regular season with a record of 13–1. Crvena zvezda won the 2014–15 Serbian League championship after a 3–0 series victory over Partizan Belgrade.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: On July 17, 2015, Marjanović signed a one-year, $1.2 million contract with the San Antonio Spurs. He made his NBA debut on October 30, recording six points and five rebounds in the Spurs' 102–75 win over the Brooklyn Nets. On December 4, he was assigned to the Austin Spurs, San Antonio's D-League affiliate. He was recalled by San Antonio on December 6, and, the following day, scored 18 points on 8-of-10 shooting in a 119–68 win over the Philadelphia 76ers. On December 28, in a win over the Minnesota Timberwolves, with Tim Duncan out injured and LaMarcus Aldridge limited to six points, Marjanović scored 17 points on 7-of-7 shooting in 14 minutes to help the Spurs defeat the Timberwolves 101–95 and extend their franchise-record home winning streak to 27 games (dating to 2014–15 season). Two days later, in a win over the Phoenix Suns, he became the first player in Spurs franchise history to record 12 rebounds in 15 minutes or less. On January 21, 2016, he recorded 17 points and a career-high 13 rebounds in a 117–89 win over the Phoenix Suns. On March 20, he was reassigned to the Austin Spurs, earning a recall two days later. On March 23, he scored a then career-high 19 points in a 112–88 win over the Miami Heat. On April 13, in the team's regular season finale, Marjanović recorded a career-high 22 points and 12 rebounds in a 96–91 win over the Dallas Mavericks.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: After the 2015–16 season, Marjanović became a restricted free agent. On July 7, 2016, he received a three-year, $21 million offer sheet from the Detroit Pistons. The Spurs declined to match the offer and he signed with the Pistons on July 12. On January 5, 2017, Marjanović recorded 15 points and a career-high 19 rebounds in a 115–114 win over the Charlotte Hornets. He had played only 76 minutes all season prior to the game against the Hornets but, with Andre Drummond in foul trouble and Aron Baynes out injured, coach Stan Van Gundy was forced to give Marjanović extended minutes. On April 7, 2017, he led the Pistons with a career-high 27 points and 12 rebounds off the bench in a 114–109 win over the Houston Rockets.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: On January 29, 2018, Marjanović, along with Tobias Harris, Avery Bradley, a future protected first-round draft pick and a future second round draft pick, was traded to the Los Angeles Clippers in exchange for Blake Griffin, Willie Reed and Brice Johnson. On February 27, 2018, he scored a season-high 18 points in a 122–120 win over the Denver Nuggets.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: On February 6, 2019, Marjanović alongside his teammate Tobias Harris was traded to the Philadelphia 76ers. In 22 appearances for the 76ers in the regular season, Marjanović averaged 8.2 points and 5.1 rebounds in 13.9 minutes per game. He later helped the 76ers get past the Brooklyn Nets in the first round of the 2019 NBA playoffs, but the 76ers were eventually eliminated by the Toronto Raptors in the Conference Semi-finals.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: On March 11, 2020, Marjanović scored a career-high 31 points, along with 17 rebounds, in a 113–97 win over the Denver Nuggets, in what was the final game before the season was suspended due to the COVID-19 pandemic.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: On June 24, 2022, Marjanović was traded alongside Trey Burke, Marquese Chriss, Sterling Brown, and the draft rights to Wendell Moore Jr., to the Houston Rockets in exchange for Christian Wood.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: As a junior national team player with Serbia, Marjanović won gold medals at the 2007 FIBA Under-19 World Championship and the 2008 FIBA Europe Under-20 Championship. He was named on the candidates list before both the EuroBasket 2009 and the 2010 FIBA World Championship, but did not get in the final 12-man squads. His senior debut with the Serbian national basketball team at a major tournament came at EuroBasket 2011 in Lithuania, where Serbia finished in eighth place.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: In August 2015, the San Antonio Spurs prohibited him from playing for the Serbian national team at EuroBasket 2015 due to risk of injury after signs of pain in his left foot, although the Serbian Basketball Federation (KSS) stated that no bone fractures were found.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: Marjanović represented Serbia at EuroBasket 2017. They won the silver medal, losing the final to Slovenia. Over 9 tournament games, he averaged 12.4 points, 4.8 rebounds and 1.4 assists per game on 56.2% shooting from the field.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: At the 2019 FIBA Basketball World Cup, the national team of Serbia was considered a favorite to win the trophy, but was eventually upset in the quarter-finals by Argentina. With wins over the United States and Czech Republic, it finished in fifth place. Marjanović averaged 6.8 points and 2.5 rebounds over 8 games.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: Marjanović made a cameo appearance as Jānis Krūmiņš in the 2015 Serbian sports drama film "We Will Be the World Champions".


title: Boban Marjanović

text: In 2019, Marjanović played an assassin named Ernest who quotes Dante's "Divine Comedy" in the American action thriller "" and fights John Wick (Keanu Reeves) in the New York Public Library.


title: Boban Marjanović

text: In 2021, Marjanović played the grand master in the 1629th episode of the Serbian television comedy show "Državni posao". Marjanović is close friends with Tobias Harris, with whom he has been traded twice. Marjanović and Harris appeared in a 2021 series of Goldfish commercials. Marjanović has also appeared in an advertising campaign for State Farm Insurance.