page_title: Wales national rugby union team
section_title: Early years (1881–1892)
hierarchical_section_title: Wales national rugby union team / History / Early years (1881–1892)
caption_attribution_description: English: Team photograph of the Wales national rugby union team before their 1895 Home Nations Championship encounter with England
context_page_description: The Wales national rugby union team represents Wales in men's international rugby union. Its governing body, the Welsh Rugby Union, was established in 1881, the same year that Wales played their first international against England. The team plays its home matches at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff, which replaced Cardiff Arms Park as the national stadium of Wales in 1999.
  Wales has competed annually in the Six Nations Championship since it was established in 1883. They have won the tournament outright 27 times, most recently in 2019, which was also a Grand Slam. Since 2005, Wales has been the most successful team in the Six Nations, winning five Six Nations titles, more than any other team, including four Grand Slams, again more than any other side. Wales has also participated in every Rugby World Cup since the competition was established in 1987; they finished third in the inaugural tournament and have since made two semi-finals, in 2011 and 2019. Wales were the host nation for the 1999 Rugby World Cup, although matches were also played in England, Scotland, Ireland and France.
context_section_description: Rugby union took root in Wales in 1850, when Reverend Rowland Williams became Vice-Principal at St David's College, Lampeter, and introduced the sport there. Wales played their first international match on 19 February 1881; organised by Newport's Richard Mullock and captained by James Bevan, they played against England, losing by seven goals, one drop goal and six tries to nil (82–0 in modern scoring values). On 12 March 1881, the Welsh Rugby Union was formed at The Castle Hotel, Neath. Two years later, the Home Nations Championship – now the Six Nations Championship – was first played, but Wales did not register a win. However, rugby in Wales developed and, by the 1890s, the Welsh had introduced the "four three-quarters" formation – with seven backs and eight forwards instead of six backs and nine forwards – which revolutionised the sport and was eventually adopted almost universally at international and club level.
caption: The 1895 Wales team before playing England in the Home Nations Championship
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