2031 Men's and 2033 Women's Rugby World Cup Championships to Be Held in the United States
Assuming that the United States still exists at that point.
Los Angeles and San Diego have both been shortlisted for the 2031 men's championship and have expressed interest in hosting the 2033 women's championship. Either city would be a fortunate placement for Linda and me, since we live in Anaheim. (For the geographically challenged, Anaheim is somewhere between L.A. to the north and San Diego to the south.) But I'm pulling for San Diego. My closest L.A. friend doesn't care nearly as much about rugby as I do about someday getting to the Birch Aquarium at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Granted, Scripps is in La Jolla, but it's still just a 21-mile stretch of various California roadways from the aquarium to Snapdragon Stadium, former home of Major League Rugby's San Diego Legion. Scripps is also a similar distance from the University of San Diego's Torero Stadium, another former home of the San Diego Legion.
Why so many former homes? Is the San Diego Legion rugby union team now homeless?
Not exactly.
The San Diego Legion will soon be nonexistent. As will Rugby Football Club Los Angeles. The two clubs are merging to become the California Legion.
The new state-centric Legion will reportedly play on rugby pitches in Los Angeles, in San Diego, and in Orange County, which sounds great on the surface, moving professional rugby closer to me and Linda. But it's probably not so great if you look a bit deeper.
The merging of the two teams drops one team from Major League Rugby's roster. And if you swing by the NOLA Gold site. you'll see this announcement:
NOLA Gold has informed the League that we do not intend to participate in the 2026 season. Discussions are ongoing with the League regarding future opportunities and potential pathways forward.
In addition, it's been reported on reddit (quoting a social media site which shant be named) that the Miami Sharks are withdrawing from MLR.
Maybe I should be as worried about Major League Rugby as I am about Mazda.
Maybe my wife and I will never happen upon Alex Corbisiero on a SoCal pitch.
But if the States stay United, and one of our nearby SoCal cities gets the honor of hosting either the 2031 or 2033 Rugby World Cup championships, and we have the time and money and the youth left to enjoy it, 60-something me would love to see a 40-something Alev Kelter, a pushing-40 Finn Russell, or a 30-something Ellie Kildunne or Aiofe Wafer or Olivia Apps play in-person just one time.
How about you, Linda? Would pushing-70 you enjoy that, too?
