The World Rugby Sevens Series is an annual series of international rugby sevens tournaments run by World Rugby featuring national sevens teams. The series, organised for the first time in the 1999–2000 season, was formed to develop an elite-level competition series between rugby nations and develop the sevens game into a viable commercial product for World Rugby. The competition was originally known as the IRB World Sevens Series, but has been known officially as the HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series since 2014 due to sponsorship from banking group HSBC.
Melrose Rugby Football Club is a rugby union club located in the town of Melrose in the Scottish Borders. The club plays at The Greenyards and competes in the Scottish Premiership.
The England national rugby sevens team competes in the World Rugby Sevens Series, Rugby World Cup Sevens and the Commonwealth Games. England's best finish in the Sevens Series is second place, which they have achieved four times, most recently in the 2016-17 season. They have once won the Rugby World Cup Sevens — the inaugural tournament in 1993.
The New Zealand national rugby sevens team competes in the World Rugby Sevens Series, Rugby World Cup Sevens, Summer Olympic Games and the Commonwealth Games. The team has been officially known as the All Blacks Sevens since 1 June 2012.
Kelso Rugby Football Club are a rugby union team founded in 1876. They play their home games at Poynder Park, Kelso in the Scottish Borders.
Ned Haig was a butcher and rugby union player notable for founding the sport of rugby sevens. He moved to Melrose when he was young. There he took up rugby and joined Melrose Rugby Football Club (RFC) in 1880. In 1883 Haig suggested hosting a sports tournament to help raise money for the Melrose RFC and came up with the idea of playing with seven rather than 15 a side and reducing the match length to 15 minutes.
The Africa Cup is an annual rugby union tournament involving African nations, organised by Rugby Africa. The tournament was first held in 2000, and has since been contested on an annual basis. Prior to being renamed the Africa Cup in 2006, the tournament was known as the CAR Top 9 and CAR Top 10.
Nashville Grizzlies RFC is a men's rugby union football club in Nashville, Tennessee. The club was formed in 2006 to bring the sport to typically under-represented populations although it welcomes anyone interested in the sport. The club is made up of approximately 90 members consisting of both active players, as well as non-playing Auxiliary members.
The New Zealand women's national rugby sevens team is the reigning women's Rugby World Cup Sevens champions, having won the most recent edition in 2018, and also have been a "core team" that participates in all rounds of the World Rugby Women's Sevens Series since that competition's inception in 2012–13.
The Ireland women's national rugby sevens team participates in international competitions such as the World Rugby Women's Sevens Series, the Rugby World Cup Sevens, the Rugby Europe Women's Sevens and Rugby sevens at the Summer Olympics. Unlike the Ireland women's national rugby union team, the sevens team is a professional team with players contracted to the Irish Rugby Football Union.
The 2016–17 World Rugby Sevens Series, known for sponsorship reasons as the HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series, was the 18th annual series of rugby sevens tournaments for national rugby sevens teams. The Sevens Series has been run by World Rugby since 1999–2000. South Africa won the Series with a comfortable 28-point margin over England; South Africa won five of the ten tournaments.
The 2017 Hong Kong Sevens was the 42nd edition of the Hong Kong Sevens tournament, and the seventh tournament of the 2016–17 World Rugby Sevens Series. The tournament was played on 7–9 April 2017 at Hong Kong Stadium in Hong Kong.
The 2016–17 World Rugby Women's Sevens Series was the fifth edition of the World Rugby Women's Sevens Series, an annual series of tournaments organised by World Rugby for women's national teams in rugby sevens.
The 2017–18 World Rugby Women's Sevens Series was the sixth edition of the global circuit for women's national rugby sevens teams, organised by World Rugby. There were five tournament events scheduled on the 2017–18 circuit and twelve teams competed in each tournament.
The men's tournament in the 2018 Rugby World Cup Sevens was held at AT&T Park in San Francisco. New Zealand won the tournament and took home the Melrose Cup by defeating England 33–12 in the final; South Africa won the bronze by deafeating Fiji 24—19. The tournament was dominated by the World Series core teams, which accounted for all eight of the teams that reached the quarterfinals. Ireland was the highest placed non core team in ninth, notching wins against core teams Kenya, Wales, and Australia.
