Internationals 2024 : Men's Northern Hemisphere

Below is a list of men's international for the north of the Equator. That's twenty four fixtures in all, not many. The thing is that most are between countries that would be classed as emerging. The two strongest northern nations (England and France) played just one match together (the highlights are below). At least there is the Samoa tour for England and France have World Cup qualifiers. 

The Netherlands did well to play three while Norway could have done better than one I would have thought. Rugby League and Union were under one administration but the Union side decided to remove the five League clubs. The Norwegian sports federation will not recognise League as there is already one Rugby code so no funding.   

There should be more matches but cost is a factor no doubt and friendlies - as most of these are - will be self funded. That said, a tour by the USA to South Africa was organised and presumably self funded so it can be done. 

While calling this the Northern Hemisphere international article, it is any internationals outside of the Australasia and the Pacific region. 

South America Championship : 2024

It is good to see this series being held, presumably locally funded. Three evenly matched countries met in Argentina to decide the 2024 champion nation. If you want to watch the matches in full, then you can simply click here and then select the match you want to watch.

First up, Chile and Brazil met and Chile took a 24-12 lead into the half time break. In the second half Chile went on with the job for a handy 44-22 victory.

Then Brazil took on the hosts and with  6-4 lead to Argentina at half time, it was tight. With one quarter of the match to be played, Argentina was up 26-4 but an amazing comeback had Brazil narrowly take the win 28-26.

The hosts Argentina then played Chile and had to win well to take the title with a favourable points differential. With Chile ahead 18-4 at the turnaround it was all but impossible for Argentina to take the championship. They fought back to win 32-28 but Chile won the tournament with one win each but with a superior points difference.

Well done to the organisers of this event. 

Internationals 2024 : Men's Wheelchair

It was led initially by France who were joined by England at the top of the tree. They are still the two leading nations although England may be slightly ahead at this point. It was good to see the USA come over for two tests against Wales and the Celtic Cup should assist those three nation's development. 

New Zealand played its first ever Wheelchair RL game against an experienced Australia. The two matches were one sided but the hopefully it will lead to more competitive games in the future.

While it was a success at the last World Cup, it does become a bit of a sleeper version of the game in the four years between. I assume the cost is a factor. Still, there are domestic competitions that are very competitive.  

Updated 25.11.24.