The 2008 Tri Nations Series was the thirteenth annual Tri Nations competition between the national

rugby union Rugby union football, commonly known simply as rugby union in English-speaking countries and rugby 15/XV in non-English-speaking world, Anglophone Europe, or often just rugby, is a Contact sport#Terminology, close-contact team sport that orig ...

teams of

New Zealand New Zealand () is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and List of islands of New Zealand, over 600 smaller islands. It is the List of isla ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

and

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic O ...

. The

All Blacks The New Zealand national rugby union team, commonly known as the All Blacks, is the representative men's national team in the sport of rugby union for the nation of New Zealand, which is considered the country's national sport. Famed for th ...

won the series on 13 September 2008 after defeating

in the last match of the series.

Background

This was the first Tri Nations tournament after South Africa's

2007 Rugby World Cup The 2007 Rugby World Cup () was the sixth Rugby World Cup, a quadrennial international rugby union competition organised by the International Rugby Board. Twenty nations competed for the Webb Ellis Cup in the tournament, which was hosted by F ...

victory, and they went into the competition as the top team in the IRB World Rankings (having ended a 175-week run for New Zealand). On 30 June 2008, before the tournament began, New Zealand and Australia were ranked second and third in the world respectively. The All Blacks went into the series with a world record 29 successive home victories, and South Africa with a 13 match winning streak. By the end of the tournament New Zealand had retaken top place in the IRB World Rankings. After 26 weeks at number one, South Africa slipped to second. Australia remained third. The final match of the

Bledisloe Cup The Bledisloe Cup is an annual rugby union competition between the national teams of Australia's Wallabies and New Zealand's All Blacks that has been contested since the 1930s. The frequency that the competition is held has varied, as has the n ...

series between Australia and New Zealand took place after the Tri-Nations, on 1 November (the first 3 matches of the series were part of the Tri-Nations).

Experimental Law Variations

Several of the sport's Experimental Law Variations (or ELVs) were trialled as part of the 2008 Tri Nations. A global trial of 13 ELVs at all levels is to be conducted for one year from 1 August 2008. The Tri Nation's governing body SANZAR approved the trial of all the ELVs that had been included in the 2008 Super 14 season, as well as the ELVs to be trialled globally. Statistics from the 2008 Super 14 revealed the ELVs increased the number of tries, reduced the number of line-outs and penalties, increased the number of free kicks, but did not change the number of scrums or

mauls A splitting maul also known as a ''block buster'', ''block splitter'', ''chop and maul'', ''sledge axe'', ''go-devil'' or ''hamaxe'' is a heavy, long-handled axe used for splitting a piece of wood along its grain. One side of its head is like a ...

. The changes increased the attacking opportunities from scrums.

Standings

Fixtures

---- *The Springboks get their first win over the All Blacks at Carisbrook, and their first win in New Zealand since 1998 ---- ---- ---- ---- * This match saw two players reach major milestones: **

Dan Carter Daniel William Carter (born 5 March 1982) is a New Zealand retired rugby union player. Carter played for the Crusaders in Super Rugby and for New Zealand's national team, the All Blacks. He is the highest point scorer in test match rugby, a ...

became the ninth player in history with 800 Test points. **

Percy Montgomery Percival Colin Montgomery (born 15 March 1974) is a Namibian-born South African former professional rugby union player. When he ended his international career in August 2008, he held the all-time records for both cap (sport), caps and points fo ...

became the ninth player in history to earn his 100th Test

cap A cap is a flat headgear, usually with a visor. Caps have crowns that fit very close to the head. They made their first appearance as early as 3200 BC. The origin of the word "cap" comes from the Old French word "chapeau" which means "head co ...

. ---- ---- ----

References

External links

All Blacks Tri Nations website
*

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tri Nations

2008 2008 was designated as: *International Year of Languages *International Year of Planet Earth *International Year of the Potato *International Year of Sanitation The Great Recession, a worldwide recession which began in 2007, continued throu ...

2008 in South African rugby union 2008 in New Zealand rugby union 2008 in Australian rugby union 2008 rugby union tournaments for national teams