page_title: Rugby union in Spain
section_title: Popularity
hierarchical_section_title: Rugby union in Spain / Popularity
caption_attribution_description: Equipo de Prebenjamines del San Roque
context_page_description: Rugby union is a growing team sport in Spain. As of 2019, there were 37,241 registered rugby union players in Spain, playing for 332 clubs in various divisions.
  The sport's governing body in Spain, the Spanish Rugby Federation, was founded in 1923. It joined the International Rugby Board in 1988, and is also a member of Rugby Europe.
  There are traditionally four main rugby playing regions in Spain: the capital Madrid, the city of Valladolid in the Old Castile region, the entire regions of Basque Country, and Catalonia, particularly in the north and also around Barcelona. Rugby has been emerging recently in Valencia and Andalucia as well, with clubs like Marbella or CAU Valencia providing several players to the national team.
  The Spanish national team plays in the Rugby Europe Championship, a competition for second tier European rugby nations such as Georgia, Romania and Russia. Spain is ranked 18th in the world, and played at the 1999 Rugby World Cup. The national sevens team is now one of the 15 "core teams" that participate in each event of the annual World Rugby Sevens Series, having earned that status at the 2017 Hong Kong Sevens.
context_section_description: There are over 51,123 registered rugby union players in Spain, with more than 221 clubs across the country. Participation rates for rugby union jumped by 20% in the Madrid area during the two years following the national team's participation in their first ever Rugby World Cup in 1999. In addition, funding from the Spanish sports council has also been on the rise. Rugby union gets low media coverage, however, compared to more popular team sports such as association football and basketball.
  There are pockets where rugby is particularly popular, such as the city of Valladolid in the Castile and León region, Sant Boi de Llobregat in Catalonia and Ordizia in the Basque country. The rugby club Biarritz Olympique, who come from the French Basque Country have played Heineken Cup matches at the 32,000-seat Estadio Anoeta in San Sebastián, Spain and attracted sell-out crowds.
  On 4 November 2014, France's professional rugby union league announced that the 2015–16 Top 14 final would be held at the Camp Nou in Barcelona on 24 June 2016. The Top 14 final is traditionally held at the Stade de France in the Paris suburb of Saint-Denis. However, the scheduling of the 2015 Rugby World Cup will cause the 2015–16 French season to be shifted by several weeks, in turn causing the Stade de France to be unavailable because it will be a major venue for UEFA Euro 2016. Holding the event in Barcelona may potentially boost the sport's popularity in that area.
  On 17 April 2016, in what is considered by many a milestone in the increasing popularity of rugby in Spain, a crowd of 26,500 attended to the Copa del Rey de Rugby final at Estadio Nuevo José Zorrilla in Valladolid. This was the 6th time that this stadium was sold out since its inauguration in 1982, including football matches. Tickets were sold out days before the match and prices rose in the Internet touting. King Felipe VI of Spain and prominent politicians like Spanish Socialist Workers' Party leader Pedro Sánchez and vice president Soraya Sáenz de Santamaría attended the match.
caption: Under-8 players at Club de Rugby San Roque, November 2007
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