RugbyFootballHistory.com

2010

19th January -The Rugby world is saddened by the news that commentating legend Bill McLaren passed away after a long illness at the age of 86. Mr McLaren, from Hawick, retired in 2002 and received an OBE, CBE and MBE for services to the sport. He began commentating on BBC radio in 1953 and moved on to television six years later.

6th February - Ronan O'Gara broke the 500 points barrier as he extended his lead as 6 Nations highest points scorer. This occured in the game agaist Italy where he scored 16 points. Little known fact: he was born in San Diego California.

13th February - Chris Patterson gained his 100th cap for Scotland in their 6 Nations game against Wales. At the time of adding this article he is Scotland's highest points scorer with 372 points in the 6 Nations alone.

100 Cap Club as of Feb 13th

George Gregan (Australia) 139
Fabien Pelous (France) 118
Jason Leonard (England) 114
Philippe Sella (France) 111
George Smith (Australia) 110
Stephen Larkham (Australia) 102
Percy Montgomery (South Africa) 102
David Campese (Australia) 101
Alessandro Troncon (Italy) 101
Gareth Thomas (Wales) 100

All time 6 Nations point scorers as of Feb 17th:

Ronan O'Gara	520
Jonny Wilkinson	506
Stephen Jones	405
Neil Jenkins	396
Chris Paterson	372
David Humphreys	267

FUTURE

2010

The BBC has revealed plans to broadcast every game from the Six Nations Championships in high definition for the first time ever.

Starting on February 6 at 2pm for Ireland's game against Italy, all matches from the tournament will be simulcast live on BBC One and BBC HD (apart from France vs Italy on March 14, which will be shown on BBC Two).

The Six Nations, featuring England, Wales, Ireland, Scotland, France and Italy, runs from February 6 to March 20, 2010. All games will be streamed live on the BBC Sport website and made available on-demand via BBC iPlayer for a week after transmission.

John Inverdale and Gabby Logan will present the BBC's TV coverage, with in-game commentary coming from Eddie Butler, Andrew Cotter and Nick Mullins, along with Jonathan Davies, Phillip Matthews, Brian Moore and Andy Nicol.

Logan and Inverdale will be joined in the studio for match analysis by Lawrence Dallaglio, Jonathan Davies, Jeremy Guscott, Raphael Ibanez, Andy Nicol, Keith Wood and former Wales captain Colin Charvis.

Games held on February 7, 14 and 27, along with the tie on March 13, will all be available to watch on BBC Sport's interactive service via the Red Button.

2011 - The 2011 Rugby World cup will be held in New Zealand. The interest in this event will be huge - 60,000 visitors are expected to visit New Zealand for this tournament.

2015/2019

The awarding of Rugby World Cup 2015 to England and the 2019 tournament to Japan heralds a new era for the sport around the globe according to International Rugby Board and Rugby World Cup Chairman Bernard Lapasset.

Lapasset, who announced the IRB Council’s decision to accept the RWCL Board’s recommendation in Dublin on Tuesday 28th July 2009, believes that the combination will ensure two key objectives are met across the two tournaments.

“I think it is a good combination between two objectives that we need, with England in 2015 a strong financial result and for 2019 we need to grow the Game in another part of the world,” said Lapasset.

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