Huge blow to rugby league World Cup 2025 as hosts France withdraw

France had been due to host the tournament in two years’ time, but the organising committee withdrew today (Monday) over “financial restraints”.

The International Rugby League (IRL) board will meet on Wednesday to discuss alternative arrangements.

A statement from France 2025 confirmed: “Despite all the work carried out by the organising committee, it hasn't been possible to fully secure the risk of a deficit.”

The organisers claimed there has been interest from cities across France keen to stage matches, but added: “This difficult decision was taken so as not to threaten the robustness of the major international sporting event models that France now wishes to promote.”

IRL chair Troy Grant insisted it is “difficult to express how disappointed I am with this news”.

He said: “There’s no secret as to how important the strengthening of France as a rugby league nation is to our global game and central to our strategic plans.“The RLWC in France in 2025 was always an ambitious project given the unprecedented short lead in time due to the pandemic, however it had the advantage of following and leveraging off the widely acknowledged RLWC2021 success.

“The factors that impacted on the bid team’s ability to complete the early structure of the tournament, such as the economic crisis and, in particular, inflationary pressure on host town council budgets, undermined their ability to secure adequate securities for the event to satisfy the government’s strict conditional benchmarks, put forward from the beginning of the process, for the tournament to proceed.

“The French Government, particularly the Sports Minister Amélie Oudéa-Castéra, supported the bid team financially and granted additional time to meet benchmarks given the interruptions and obstacles that were put in their way that were out of their control.  

“I respect the French Government’s decision amid the challenges they are facing, but can’t hide my disappointment, that I conveyed clearly to them in person. 

“Despite our focus having been on France, we will now accelerate our consideration of other contingency options.

“The board meets face to face in July and we will then be able to determine together our next steps forward and consider the other bids we have received for not only 2025, but 2029, 2033 and World Cup 9s events in the future.”