Great Britain 2011 Wheelchair Rugby

Great Britain is issuing 10 stamps on 27 July 2011 as a precommemoration of the Paralympic Games 2012; among the 10 stamps is one featuring 2 persons on wheelchairs fighting for a ball, captioned as "Wheelchair Rugby". The fact that it is a contact sport, and its name are all this sport has in common with rugby union! And it is played with a round ball, as shown on the stamp! Description for it does sound pretty violent, and according to an entry in Wikipedia, its original name is murderball! Suffice to say it is a contact sport played by disabled people on wheelchair on a hardwood court with 4 wheelchairs to a side.

RWC 2011 20 Unions Stamp Sheet

NZ Post has released a personalised collector's sheet with stamp labels featuring the logos of the 20 participating unions for Rugby World Cup 2011. From left to right, in each of the 4 rows, the logos are for unions of the nations:
Argentina, Australia, Canada, England, Fiji
France, Georgia, Ireland, Italy, Japan
Namibia, New Zealand, Romania, Russia, Samoa
Scotland, South Africa, Tonga, USA, Wales.

Italy 2010 Mario Mazzuca

Released 30 October 2010, the stamp celebrates the birth centenary of Mario Mazzuca. Mario Mazzuca was a pioneer of Italian rugby scene, dedicating over 50 years to the sport, first as a player, then a referee, and then in management at both national and international levels. He was founder and first president of Ciara, Italian Amateur Rugby Club, and has represented Italy in the Fédération Internationale de Rugby Amateur (FIRA) since 1966. In 1973, he was appointed Special Commissioner of the Italian Rugby Federation, and member of the Executive Committee of the Olympic Committee. mario passed away 3 October 1983 in Rome. In 2007, the City of Rome named a city street after Mario - "Largo Mario Mazzuca" - located below the Stadio Flaminio, which is the home to the Italian Rugby Federation.

Geogia 2010 3-time European Nations Cup Champion

This stamp, released 15 October 2010, celebrates the Georgian National Rugby Team becoming 3-time European Nations Cup Champions (2001, 2006-08, 2008-10). The European Nations Cup is the European championship for tier 2 and tier 3 rugby union nations. The championship is split into 7 divisions with 5 or 6 teams in each. The divisions play on a two-year cycle with the teams playing each other both home and away. In the latest round (2008-10), the top division (Division 1A) comprises Georgia, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Spain and Ukraine.

San Marino 2010 "The Football Players" by Henri Rousseau

This 1.50-euro stamp, featuring Henri Rousseau's "The Football Players", from San Marino was issued 26 July 2010 together with 3 other stamps featuring paintings by Botticelli (The Birth of Venus), Giorgione da Castelfranco Veneto (The Tempest) & Caravaggio (The Supper at Emmaus). This painting was first displayed at the Salon des Indépendants in 1908, the only exhibition held during Rousseau's lifetime; Rousseau died 2 years later. The painting links back to the first rugby matches held in France; and in it, Rousseau attempted to express movement.He used real models, representing them with care, and in particular, he creates the notion of distance by gradually reducing the size of the leaves. His painting style, deemed infantile at the beginning, sort of pioneered modernist painting styles - followed by famous artists like Picasso. "The Football Players" is currently located at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York, as part of an exhibition to commemorate the centenary of Rousseau's death.

Interestingly, the stamp spells Henri as Henry, and printed its title as "Rugby Players" in italian. In the 1908 London Olympic Games, rugby was classed as football, and only Great Britain (represented by the team from Cornwall) and Australia were represented.

Rugby Junior World Cup 2010

Argentina, host of the 2010 Rugby Junior World Cup, issued on 20 June 2010 a single stamp to commemorate the event. The players in this cup event have to be under 20 years of age. The Junior World Cup Trophy has been in New Zealand hands from the 1st tournament held in Wales in 2008, and remained so for 2010.

Papua New Guinea 2010 Rugby Sevens

Papua New Guinea came out with an issue for the XIXth Commonwealth Games (Delhi, India) on 3 September 2010, one month ahead of the actual games. The issue comprises 4 stamps, 1 miniature sheet and 1 sheetlet with 4 stamps. Rugby sevens, a sport that first appeared in the XVIth edition of the games in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, is featured in the 1K stamp and on the selvage of the miniature sheet (featuring tennis) at the bottom. The illustration is the same in both cases, a PNG player scoring a try in between the posts!