First Rugby International - 27th March 1871
On this day in 1871, the first rugby international was played between Scotland and England with MRC providing four of the England side.
The 1871 rugby union match between Scotland and England was a single international rugby union match played between the Scotland and England national rugby union teams on 27 March 1871. This was the world's very first international rugby union match, and was played at Raeburn Place, Edinburgh in front of 4,000 spectators. The match was won by Scotland which scored two tries and a goal to England's single try.
The match resulted from a challenge issued in the sporting weekly Bell's Weekly on 8 December 1870 and signed by the captains of five Scottish clubs, inviting any team "selected from the whole of England" to a 20-a-side game to be played under the Rugby rules. The game was played at Raeburn Place, Edinburgh, the home ground of Edinburgh Academicals, on 27 March 1871. The English team wore all white, with a red rose on its shirts and the Scots, brown shirts with a thistle and white cricket flannels. Three international matches played according to Association Football rules had already taken place at the Oval, London, in 1870 and 1871.
The game, played over two halves, each of 50 minutes, was won by Scotland, who scored a goal with a successful conversion kick after grounding the ball over the goal line (permitting them to 'try' to kick a goal). Both sides achieved a further 'try' each, but failed to convert them to goals, as the kicks were unsuccessful. Angus Buchanan was the first man to score a try in international rugby.
England: A. G. Guillemard (West Kent), Richard Osborne (Manchester), Arthur Lyon (Liverpool), William MacLaren (Manchester), John Edmund Bentley (Gipsies), Frank Tobin (Liverpool), JF Green (West Kent), Reg Birkett (Clapham Rovers), Benjamin Burns (Blackheath), JH Clayton (Liverpool), Charles Arthur Crompton (Blackheath), Alfred Davenport (Ravenscourt Park), JM Dugdale (Ravenscourt Park), AS Gibson (Manchester), Alfred St. George Hamersley (Marlborough Nomads), John Luscombe (Gipsies), Charles Sherrard (Blackheath), Frederick Stokes (Blackheath) capt., DP Turner (Richmond), H.J.C. Turner (Manchester)