History
Source: "Des Filles en Ovalie", Editions Atlantica (2005), Written by Jacques Corte / Yaneth Pinilla B. Foreword by Serge Betsen.
There are records of women's rugby being played in France as early as the mid-1890s, and in the 1920s a form of the game called "barette" was very popular, with national championships. However, after the 1930s the game had all but disappeared, and was not revived until 1965 when groups of students in Lyon and Toulouse decided to take part in the great charitable campaign against world hunger. Most of them had brothers and friends who played rugby, so they decide to organise a charity game at Bourg-en-Bresse.
So successful was this that a regular series of games began, with clubs being formed as students graduated, initially mainly in the south. In 1969 a national association - the ARF - was formed. Despite initial opposition to the game from both the government and the FFR (who briefly banned any FFR officials from officiating at women's games) by 1976 12 clubs were taking part in national competitions.
In 1982, by which time the number of clubs had more than doubled, the ARF signed a memorandum of understanding was agreed with the FFR which finally gave their gave official backing - and in the same year France took part in the first ever women's rugby international.
Read more about this topic: France Women's National Rugby Union Team
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.”
—Karl Marx (1818–1883)
“Systematic philosophical and practical anti-intellectualism such as we are witnessing appears to be something truly novel in the history of human culture.”
—Johan Huizinga (1872–1945)
“Every library should try to be complete on something, if it were only the history of pinheads.”
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–1894)