I’ve compiled the average scores in professional and international rugby tournaments. If you just want the numbers, here are the average home and away scores.
The rest of this article has background, commentary and analysis on these results.
| Season | Home | Away | |
| England Premiership | 2020/21 | 27 | 23 |
| PRO 14 | 2020/21 | 27 | 24 |
| France Top 14 | 2020/21 | 29 | 21 |
| USA Major League Rugby | 2020/21 | 27 | 24 |
| European Rugby Champions Cup | 2020/21 | 26 | 24 |
| Super Rugby | 2020/21 | 28 | 25 |
| World Cup | Home | Away |
| 2019 | 35 | 14 |
| 2015 | 34 | 17 |
| 2011 | 34 | 13 |
| Rugby Championship | Home | Away |
| 2019 | 24 | 23 |
| 2018 | 29 | 26 |
| Six Nations | Home | Away |
| 2021 | 24 | 26 |
| 2020 | 25 | 20 |
| 2019 | 25 | 20 |
What Is The Average Score In Professional Club Rugby?
The average score in professional rugby matches at club level across the world was 27 points to 24 in the 2020/2021 season.
The home team wins most often but the average winning margin is three points. The average scores across six professional competitions worldwide are very similar.
| Club Competition | Season | Home | Away |
| England Premiership | 2020/21 | 27 | 23 |
| PRO 14 | 2020/21 | 27 | 24 |
| France Top 14 | 2020/21 | 29 | 21 |
| USA Major League Rugby | 2020/21 | 27 | 24 |
| European Rugby Champions Cup | 2020/21 | 26 | 24 |
| Super Rugby | 2020/21 | 28 | 25 |
Disrupted season
Some competitions in the 2020/2021 season were interrupted due to the COVID pandemic.
For example, the PRO 14 was suspended for several months. However, the competition was resumed in a shortened format and was completed with a final.
Super Rugby, the top-level Southern Hemisphere tournament, was confined to Australian and New Zealand franchises in 2020/2021. The South African teams did not take part, along with Argentina or Japanese representation.
I’ve excluded walk-over results where one club couldn’t fulfill the fixture due to COVID infections. Usually, tournaments awarded a nil result to the failing team and an arbitrary score to the other (sometimes 28 points).
Professional competitions
The six competitions are the major professional tournaments in Rugby Union. There are other semi-professional leagues that I haven’t included e.g. the French second division.
These three competitions have teams solely from one country:
- England Premiership
- France Top 14
- USA MLR
The PRO 14 has professional teams from Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Italy, and South Africa. This competition has a lot of history, but it keeps changing its brand name! It resumed after the COVID break as the Rainbow Cup.
The European Rugby Champions Cup is also known as the European Championship (formerly the Heineken Cup). It includes the top teams from the tournaments below (without the South African teams):
- England Premiership
- France Top 14
- PRO 14
Super Rugby 2020/2021 had franchises from Australia and New Zealand.
Interesting insights
Five of the six competitions had remarkably close average scores, with the home team edging the result.
Two, three, or four points separated the teams at the end. Of course, three points is a single penalty. I would conclude that these tournaments are highly competitive.
The exception was the Top 14, with a wider difference of eight points.
I ran my eye over the individual Top 14 scores to see what was going on. There were more “blow-out” scores of teams hitting over 50 points against a low score from the opposition.
What Is The Average Score In International Rugby?
There is more variation across international tournaments than at club level.
Rugby World Cup
I’ll start with the World Cup which occurs every four years. Here are the averages of the last three tournaments.
| World Cup | Home | Away |
| 2019 | 35 | 14 |
| 2015 | 34 | 17 |
| 2011 | 34 | 13 |
The average scores are remarkably consistent, even though the sport has seen some major changes over a decade. The perception may be that defenses are on top, but that isn’t represented by a narrowing score.
However, it’s fair to say that the World Cup is different from all the other tournaments in terms of the difference between the top teams and the next level.
The averages are skewed by the pool games where the top teams ran up big scores against one or two of the teams in the group.
For example, New Zealand beat Namibia by 62 points. Scotland put 61 points to nil against Russia.
Rugby Championship (Southern Hemisphere)
I’ve taken two seasons of the Rugby Championship because the number of countries involved keeps changing.
This competition used to be the Tri-Nations with Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa. Various franchises from Argentina and Japan have been included at different times.
2018 and 2019 had Argentina, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa. So, I’ve taken the averages from those two seasons.
| Rugby Championship | Home | Away |
| 2019 | 24 | 23 |
| 2018 | 29 | 26 |
As you can see, the averages are remarkably close in 2019 (one point). And not so wide the year before (three points).
Home team advantage continues to be seen in this tournament.
Six Nations (Northern Hemisphere)
The Six Nations is the top-tier European competition with these national teams:
- England
- France
- Ireland
- Italy
- Scotland
- Wales
Here are the average scores over three years:
| Six Nations | Home | Away |
| 2021 | 24 | 26 |
| 2020 | 25 | 20 |
| 2019 | 25 | 20 |
This is the only tournament where I’ve seen an Away average score as higher than the Home score.
So, I had a closer look at the 2021 results. The reason was a collapse in form of Italy in their home games. Usually, Italy put up a good fight at home but they conceded big scores in the Stadio Olimpico.
However, the 2021 season was impacted by COVID. Matches were played with very limited crowds. This may have been part of Italy’s undoing.
More Match Statistics
Check out our other articles on match scores at international and professional club level. You may find some surprises!
- Highest and lowest scores in rugby matches
- Percentage of draws in rugby matches worldwide
- Which position in rugby scores the most tries?
Sources For Match Scores
I’ve compiled these scores using match data from FlashScore.com.