Every women\u2019s game at this year\u2019s Rugby League World Cup will span 70 minutes rather than 80 in line with the NRLW, it\u2019s been confirmed.<\/p>\n
This autumn\u2019s tournament will take place Down Under across Australia and Papua New Guinea, with the hosts officially being the Australian Rugby League Commission (ARLC).<\/p>\n
The ARLC have had a proposal endorsed by the International Rugby League (IRL) board to adopt the NRLW Premiership rules.<\/p>\n
Accordingly, technology such as the Video Review Bunker, Captain\u2019s Challenge and Shot Clocks for scrums, goal-line dropouts and goal kicks (conversion attempts) can be adopted.<\/p>\n
2026 Women\u2019s Rugby League World Cup adopts shorter game format in shock rule change<\/p>\n
The Match Review and Judiciary process will also follow the same guidelines as are in place in the NRL and NRLW, alongside HIA policy and on-field rules for trainers.<\/p>\n
But the biggest takeaway from the rule confirmations is that each women\u2019s game this autumn will span just 70 minutes.<\/p>\n
This is in line with the standard in NRLW and Women\u2019s Pacific Championships.<\/p>\n
Australia\u2019s Jillaroos are the holders of the Women\u2019s Rugby League World Cup having won each of the last three instalments.<\/p>\n
Their most recent success, in the delayed 2021 edition held in the UK in 2022, saw them beat New Zealand 54-4 in the final at Old Trafford to be crowned champions.<\/p>\n
Since then, the Jillaroos have gone on to win the Women\u2019s Pacific Championships in both 2024 and 2025 as well as thumping England 90-4 in a Test match in Las Vegas last March.<\/p>\n
Elsewhere, the IRL board have also confirmed that Lebanon, who will compete in the Men\u2019s Rugby League World Cup this autumn, will have a squad largely comprising of players based in the Southern Hemisphere.<\/p>\n
This is due to a decision made not to send any domestic players to be involved in the tournament due to the war the country currently finds itself embroiled in.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Every women\u2019s game at this year\u2019s Rugby League World Cup will span 70 minutes rather than 80 in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":638631,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85],"class_list":["post-638630","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-rugby","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/638630","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=638630"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/638630\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/638631"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=638630"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=638630"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=638630"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}