The Asian Rugby Football Union is running it’s first ever 15 aside Division 2 international tournament next year in Lao.
Up to now only the topfour tier of teams in the regionhave met regularly to compete but next year sides including Lao, China and the Philippines will all play in the second division event.
China's inclusion is perhaps the most eye catching given how little they compete outside of the 7s circuit.
Lao have been working hard to develop the women’s game at grass roots level and will host the tournament on the back of appointing a new national women’s coach and a High Performance Adviser. Katie Wurst, who has worked with USA Rugby, will take the role of coach while Shirley Russell, a former Wallaroo will be High Performance Manager.
To date the Asian Rugby Football Union has only ever run 15s championships for top teams in the region such as Kazakhstan, Japan, Singapore and Hong Kong. There was no tournament this year but these teams did play each other as curtain raisers for the men’s Asian Five Nations competition. It is understood that the women’s 15s programme in Asia will be formalised with the creation of an Asian Women’s Four Nations in time by 2013.
