KYOTO – The draw for the 2019 Rugby World Cup in Japan will be held at the Kyoto State Guest House in Kyoto on Wednesday.
Executives from each participating national side will visit Shimogamo-jinja shrine, which is regarded as the birthplace of rugby in the Kansai region and is also a designated UNESCO World Heritage site.
The representatives will attend a ceremony at a monument in the precincts of the shrine that commemorates the birth of rugby in the region.
Members of one of the local rugby clubs are hoping the visit will promote the sport in Japan, with a representative saying, “We want to spread the fact that Kyoto is still one of the spiritual homes of rugby in the nation.”
Japanese rugby is said to have started in 1899, when a British language teacher introduced the sport to students at Keio University in Tokyo.
According to senior members of the Kyoto University Rugby Football Club, rugby was not widely played in the Kanto region initially.
A Keio student taught rugby to his relative and other students of Third High School (now Kyoto University) in the precincts of Shimogamo-jinja in 1910.
The following year, the nations’s second rugby club was established at Third High School.
Rugby has rapidly grown in popularity in Kyoto since the early days of the sport’s introduction in the region.
Kyoto’s Doshisha University established a rugby club in 1911; a junior high school and a commercial school in the city also established clubs soon after.
People from Kyoto who were involved in the sport also appear to have been responsible for establishing rugby clubs in the Kanto region, such as at Waseda University and the University of Tokyo, both in Tokyo.
Unfortunately, Kyoto failed in its campaign to host a match in the upcoming World Cup.
However, in November last year, the sport’s international governing body World Rugby selected Kyoto as the host city for the official draw, recognising the city as the centre of Japanese culture and history.
The Kansai Rugby Football Union, among others, has been lobbying the organising committee to invite head coaches from each participating national team and other national representatives to the hosting ceremony at Shimogamo-jinja.
On Wednesday, prior to the draw, former players from Third High School, representatives of Kyoto University and Keio University rugby football clubs, and World Cup representatives from participating nations will visit the monument and observe a traditional kemari ritual.
Attendees will also be invited to sign ema wooden plaques in the shape of a rugby ball.
Fumio Wada, 79, a former vice chairman of the Japan Rugby Football Union and also former chairman of the Kyoto University Rugby Football Club, said: “It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to state that Japanese rugby was developed predominantly based on the enthusiasm of Third High School players in the early days. It is poignant that the official draw of the first Rugby World Cup to be held in the nation will take place in Kyoto.”
Rugby’s World Cup champions are decided at a tournament held every four years. Twenty countries will participate in the 2019 event in Japan.
The pool-stage matches are planned to take place at 12 venues across the country, with the opening game scheduled for Sept. 20, and the final being played on Nov. 2.
