World Cup 2014 details revealed

The World Cup Final will take place on August 17th.

All of the pool games for the for the World Cup will take place at the Centre National du Rugby (CNR) in Marcoussis and Marcoussis Rugby Club with the French union adopting the concept of restricting the tournament to one or two locations which worked very well in London in 2010.  Marcoussis is about 20 miles south of Paris.

The knockout stages of the tournament will also see matches played at the CNR in Marcoussis, with the semi-finals, Bronze Final and Final taking place at Stade Jean Bouin in the French capital – home of Stade Francais.

The matches will take place on August 1, 5, 9, 13, with the final played on August 17.

The tournament format will be the same as it was in 2010, with 12 teams split into three pools of four. The pool allocation draw will take place once all 12 teams are confirmed.

Eight teams have already qualified for Women's Rugby World Cup 2014 in defending champions New Zealand, 2010 runners-up England, Australia, hosts France, USA, Canada, Ireland and Wales.

With one round remaining of the qualifier in Madrid, four teams – Italy, Spain, Samoa and Scotland – are still in contention for those two qualification places going into the final day on Saturday.

This will leave only two places remaining, to be filled by an African and Asian qualifier.

IRB Tournament Director Philippe Bourdarias, speaking at the event in Madrid, said: “It's great to finally announce the dates and venues for the Women's Rugby World Cup in 2014. A lot of work has gone on behind the scenes to get us here, and it's really shaping up to be a World Cup like no other.”

“We’ve all seen how Women's Rugby has progressed rapidly since the last World Cup in 2010 in England. We want to build on that success, and I have no doubt that the 12 teams that travel to France next year will give us a master-class in Rugby at this elite level.”