page_title: Rugby league in France
section_title: Post-war to the present
hierarchical_section_title: Rugby league in France / Post-war to the present
caption_attribution_description: France-Australie à Toulouse, le dimanche 21 novembre 2004
context_page_description: Rugby league has been played in France since 1934. As with rugby union, rugby league was introduced by the English and the heartland of the game is in the south of France.
  During the Second World War, in association with the French Rugby Federation, the sport was banned by the Vichy government, an act from which the code has struggled to recover. There has been a recent resurgence of the sport following the admission of Catalans Dragons to the Super League. In 2012, there were approximately 30,000 active participants.
context_section_description: On 10 July 1947, a gentleman's agreement was signed between the Ligue Française de rugby à treize (Paul Barrière as representative), the French republic and the French rugby union for division of the Ligue Française de rugby à treize in two parts: a Federation française de jeu à treize as the governing body of the amateur game and a Ligue de rugby à XIII as the governing body for the semi-professional game. Although the ban on rugby league was lifted, it was prevented from using the word rugby in its title from 24 April 1949 until 26 June 1991, having to use the name Jeu à Treize (Game of Thirteen).
  After the war the French game was re-established and the French became one of rugby league's major powers. France was the driving force behind the establishment of the Rugby League World Cup following the war. The first Rugby League World Cup was held in France in 1954; the final at Parc des Princes was narrowly lost by France 12-16 to a young, underdog Great Britain. France played major international series against Great Britain, Australia and New Zealand. In 1951 and 1955, the French national team toured Australia and won both Test series 2-1; these squads are still regarded as two of the strongest sides ever to tour Australia.
  The French maintained an excellent record in international rugby league until the 1980s, triumphing over Australia again in the home 1967-68 series and finishing as runner-up to Australia in the 1968 Rugby League World Cup. The Chanticleers also defeated Australia in the home 1978 Test series by 2 Tests to nil - a feat not repeated over Australia by another international team until the 2005 Rugby League Tri-Nations series win by New Zealand. Their competitiveness against Australia, Great Britain and New Zealand began to decline in the 1980s and they have yet to recover their former strength, with their last win over one of those teams being in 1990 against Great Britain.
  The original proposal for the Super League in 1995 was for two French clubs, with both Paris and Toulouse being proposed. This was subsequently reduced to one, after much discussion among clubs. In February 1996, a French team, Paris Saint-Germain was formed to take part in the otherwise English Super League. The players being drawn from the French league. It was abandoned in October 1997, partly because Paris was not in the southern heartland of French rugby league and partly because the players had the double burden of playing for both Paris and their original club.
  In 1998, XIII Actif were formed under the Chairmanship of French rugby league historian Robert Fassolette, to put pressure on the French government over the Vichy banning of the sport and the return of stolen assets. The French Minister of Sport commissioned an enquiry, which found in favour of XIII Actif. The Court then ruled that only the French rugby league federation could take up the case further. This they declined to do.
  Professional rugby league returned to France in February 2006 when Perpignan-based club Catalans Dragons joined Super League. They provided French rugby league with a major boost by demonstrating their prowess before nearly 85,000 people at Wembley in the Final of the 2007 Rugby League Challenge Cup. In 2018 they won the RL Challenge Cup, beating Warrington Wolves 20 - 14 before a 50,672 crowd at Wembley.
caption: France playing Australia, November 2004
exif: {"Image Make": "Panasonic", "Image Model": "DMC-FZ20", "Image Orientation": "0", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image DateTime": "2004:11:21 16:22:27", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image ExifOffset": "397", "Image PrintIM": "[80, 114, 105, 110, 116, 73, 77, 0, 48, 50, 53, 48, 0, 0, 14, 0, 1, 0, 22, 0, ... ]", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "6775", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "8624", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/100", "EXIF FNumber": "14/5", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Program Normal", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "80", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0220", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2004:11:21 16:22:27", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2004:11:21 16:22:27", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "2", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "3", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "72", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "Uncalibrated", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "640", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "447", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "6651", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "0", "EXIF FocalLengthIn35mmFilm": "432", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF GainControl": "None", "EXIF Contrast": "Normal", "EXIF Saturation": "Normal", "EXIF Sharpness": "Normal"}