Rugby World Cup qualification
Qualification by continent -- Oceania
Table:
Tournament
Automatically qualified
Qualified via competition
Eliminated in
repechage

1987

Australia
New Zealand
Fiji
Tonga

—

—

1991

Australia
Fiji
New Zealand

Western Samoa

—

1995

Australia
Western Samoa
New Zealand

Tonga

—

1999

New Zealand

Australia
Fiji
Samoa
Tonga

—

2003

Australia
New Zealand

Fiji
Samoa
Tonga

—

2007

Australia
New Zealand

Fiji
Samoa
Tonga

—

2011

Australia
Fiji
New Zealand
Tonga

Samoa

—

2015

Australia
New Zealand
Samoa
Tonga

Fiji

—

2019

Australia
New Zealand

Fiji
Samoa
Tonga

Cook Islands

With reference to the accompanying table and the textual context listed.

Respond to the question below: In what tournament year was the automatically qualified country one that is commonly known as the All Blacks ? Respond with the correct answer (omit explanations) in JSON format as {"answer": "YOUR ANSWER"}. Use only the information given.

The 1987 Rugby World Cup was the first Rugby World Cup . New Zealand and Australia agreed to co-host the tournament . New Zealand hosted 20 matches - 17 pool stage matches , two quarter-finals and the final - while Australia hosted 12 matches - seven pool matches , two quarter-finals and both semi-finals . The event was won by co-hosts New Zealand , who were the strong favourites and won all their matches comfortably . France were losing finalists , and Wales surprise third-place winners : Australia , having been second favourites , finished fourth after conceding crucial tries in the dying seconds of both the semi-final against France and the third-place play-off against Wales . Sixteen teams competed in the inaugural tournament . Seven of the 16 places were automatically filled by the International Rugby Football Board ( IRFB ) members - New Zealand , Australia , England , Scotland , Ireland , Wales and France . South Africa was unable to compete because of the international sporting boycott due to apartheid . There was no qualification process to fill the remaining nine spots . Instead invitations were sent out to Argentina , Fiji , Italy , Canada , Romania , Tonga , Japan , Zimbabwe and the United States . This left Western Samoa controversially excluded , despite their better playing standard than some of the teams invited . The USSR were to be invited but they declined the invitation on political grounds , allegedly due to the continued IRFB membership of South Africa .
The Australia national rugby union team , nicknamed the Wallabies , is the representative national team in the sport of rugby union for the nation of Australia . The team first played at Sydney in 1899 , winning their first test match against the touring British Isles team . Australia have competed in all eight Rugby World Cups , winning the final on two occasions and also finishing as runner-up twice . Australia beat England at Twickenham in the final of the 1991 Rugby World Cup and won again in 1999 at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff when their opponents in the final were France . The Wallabies also compete annually in The Rugby Championship ( formerly the Tri-Nations ) , along with southern hemisphere counterparts Argentina , New Zealand and South Africa . They have won this championship on four occasions . Australia also plays Test matches against the various rugby-playing nations . More than a dozen former Wallabies players have been inducted into the World Rugby Hall of Fame .
The New Zealand national rugby union team , commonly known as the All Blacks , represents New Zealand in men 's international rugby union , which is considered to be the country 's national sport . The team won the Rugby World Cup in 2011 and 2015 , as well as the inaugural tournament in 1987 . New Zealand has a 77 per cent winning record in test match rugby , and is the only international men 's side to have secured more wins than losses against every opponent . Since their international debut in 1903 , they have played test matches against 19 nations , of which 12 have never won a game against the All Blacks . The team has also played against three multinational all-star teams , losing only eight of 45 matches . Since the introduction of the World Rugby Rankings in 2003 , New Zealand has held the number one ranking longer than all other teams combined . They jointly hold the record for the most consecutive test match wins for a tier one ranked nation , along with England . The All Blacks compete with Argentina , Australia and South Africa in The Rugby Championship , and have won the trophy sixteen times in the competition 's 23-year history . The team has completed a Grand Slam tour , against the four nations of the United Kingdom , four times ( 1978 , 2005 , 2008 and 2010 ) . New Zealand has been named the World Rugby Team of the Year ten times since the award was created in 2001 , and an All Black has won the World Rugby Player of the Year award ten times over the same period . Fifteen former All Blacks have been inducted into the International Rugby Hall of Fame . The team 's first match was in 1884 in New South Wales , and their first international test match was in 1903 against Australia in Sydney .
The Fiji national rugby union team represents Fiji in men 's international rugby union competes every four years at the Rugby World Cup , and their best performances were the 1987 and 2007 tournaments when they defeated Argentina and Wales respectively to reach the quarterfinals . Fiji also regularly plays test matches during the June and November test windows . Fiji also plays in the Pacific Tri-Nations , and has won the most Pacific Tri-Nations Championships of the three participating teams . Fiji is one of the few countries where rugby union is the main sport . There are approximately 80,000 registered players from a total population of around 950,000 . One of the problems for Fiji is simply getting their rugby players to play for Fiji as a country , as many have contracts in Europe or with Super Rugby teams where the money is far more rewarding . The repatriated salaries of its overseas stars have become an important part of some local economies . The cibi ( pronounced [ ˈðimbi ] ) war dance is performed by the Fiji rugby team before each Test match . It has been used on the rugby field since 1939 , though its origins date back to the country 's warring times with its Pacific neighbours .
The Tonga national rugby union team is nicknamed ʻIkale Tahi ( Sea Eagles ) . Like their Polynesian neighbours , the Tongans start their matches with a war dance - the Sipi Tau . They are members of the Pacific Islands Rugby Alliance ( PIRA ) along with Fiji and Samoa . The Ikale Tahi achieved a historic 19-14 victory over France in the 2011 Rugby World Cup , but having lost to New Zealand and Canada , were unable to achieve what would have been their first ever presence at the quarter-finals .
In qualification for the 1991 Rugby World Cup , Asia and Oceania were combined . The qualifying round-robin tournament was played in Japan in April 1990 . The top two teams ( Western Samoa and Japan ) qualified for the finals and were allocated to Pool 3 and Pool 2 , respectively .
The Samoa national rugby union team ( also known as Manu Samoa ) represents Samoa in men 's international rugby union and it 's governed by the Samoa Rugby Union . The name Manu Samoa is in honour of a famous Samoan warrior . They perform a traditional Samoan challenge called the siva tau before each game . Samoa Rugby Union were formerly members of the Pacific Islands Rugby Alliance ( PIRA ) along with Fiji and Tonga . They are ranked 15th in the world . Rugby was introduced to Samoa in the early 1920s and a governing body was soon formed . The first international was played as Western Samoa against Fiji in August 1924 . Along with Tonga , these nations would meet regularly and eventually contest competitions such as the Pacific Tri-Nations - with Western Samoa winning the first of these . From 1924 to 1997 Samoa was known as Western Samoa . Samoa have been to every Rugby World Cup since the 1991 tournament . That tournament , along with the 1995 competition , saw them make the quarter-finals . Under their new coach , former New Zealand and Samoan international player Michael Jones , Samoa competed in the 2007 Rugby World Cup .
For the 1995 Rugby World Cup in South Africa , the Oceania teams from Australia , New Zealand and Western Samoa were granted automatic entry due to reaching the quarter-final stages of the 1991 tournament . Oceania was granted one further qualifying place , which was decided by a simple home and away play-off between Fiji and Tonga in 1993 . Each team lost their home match , but Tonga won the play-off on aggregate score .
For the 1999 Rugby World Cup qualifiers , the Oceanian Federation was allocated three places in the final tournament and one place in the repechage . Seven teams played in the Oceania qualifiers that were held over three stages from 1996 to 1998 . Australia , Fiji and Western Samoa were the top three sides and secured their places as Oceania 1 , Oceania 2 and Oceania 3 , respectively , for RWC 99 . Tonga qualified for the repechage tournament .
In qualification for the 2003 Rugby World Cup , a number of positions were available to Oceania nations . Fiji , Samoa and the Tonga would eventually qualify , joining automatic qualifiers Australia and New Zealand .
In qualification for the 2007 Rugby World Cup , there were two places available for Oceania teams , and one place in the repechage . In the group rounds , there were three points awarded for a win , two for a draw , and one for a loss . There were no bonus points awarded .
There was one qualifier for Rugby World Cup 2011 from the Oceania region . The qualifying process began with the 2009 Oceania Nations Cup , with the winner going on to play Samoa . The first stage was the four team Oceania Nations Cup . The Cup was played as a straight knock-out . The winner then advanced to the final qualifier against Samoa , a two legged playoff to decide the Oceania Qualifier who faced South Africa , Wales , Fiji , and the African qualifier ( Namibia ) in Pool D Oceania was the only region not to send a team to the 20th place playoff .
The Federation of Oceania Rugby Unions ( FORU ) section of the 2015 Rugby World Cup qualification involved five teams competing for one spot in the final tournament in England .
Qualifying for the 2019 Rugby World Cup for Oceania Rugby began in June 2016 , where across 2 years , 3 teams competed for two direct qualification spots from Oceania . Two places were available to Oceania in a cross-regional play-off series ' to qualify for the World Cup and or advance through the Repechage . Two teams from the Oceania region , New Zealand and Australia , qualified automatically for the 2019 World Cup by finishing in the top 12 in the 2015 World Cup . Fiji and Tonga qualified by finishing first and second ( on aggregate ) in the 2016 and 2017 Pacific Nations Cup competitions . Samoa advanced to the cross regional play-off where they would play a team from Europe for a place in the World Cup ; the loser would move to the Repechage . Tahiti won the 2017 Oceania Rugby Cup to advance to the second cross regional play-off , but were disqualified in March 2018 after a World Rugby investigation found they had fielded two ineligible players in their match against the Cook Islands . The Cook Islands were then declared winner of the Oceania Rugby Cup and will advance to the regional playoff to play a team from Asia for a place in the Repechage .
The Cook Islands is a third tier rugby union playing nation . They began playing international rugby in the early 1971 . Thus far , the Cook Islands have not made an appearance at any of the World Cups .