The french post issued on 12 June 2010, 24 pre-personalised minisheets to illustrate regional attractions and specialities, each minisheet comes with 10 self-adhesive stamps. The one for the region of Languedoc-Rousillon illustrates rugby (scrum) and has one of the 10 stamps featuring a "Wallaby" rugby ball placed for kicking.
After writing about the Monaco issue for the 5 Nations Tournament, I suddenly remembered that France released a collector's sheet 4 days before the Monaco issue, on 4 February, featuring one of the better rugby team in France - Stade Toulousain. Some may argue that this is not a true philatelic issue, since it is even classed as pre-personalised stamp sheet by the french post, composing of 10 stamps for local use, featuring ST players.
This is the first rugby stamp in 2010 that I know of, from Monaco, released on 8 February 2010, to commemorate 100 years of the 5 Nations Tournament, the 5 being England, Wales, Scotland, Ireland and France. It was in 1910 that France joined the 4 nations on the British Isles that gave birth to the name of the tournament. The stamp features the flags of all the 5 participating nations, and 2 players challenging for the ball in a lineout, one spotting blue jersey decorated with the gallic cockerel, that should represent France, the other in white - the crest on the jersey isn't clear, so I'll hazard a guess that he is from the English team.
I purchased this New Caledonian stamp featuring Joemy, the mascot (a bat) for the 14th Pacific Islands Games to be held in 2011. Apparently the sheet border is decorated with icons of the sports featured in these games, and I was lucky to get the one that featured 7-a-side rugby!
I wanted to watch Invictus when I first found out about it early January, because the movie is linked to 3 favourites/heroes of mine - rugby, Nelson Mandela and Morgan Freeman. I only managed to watch it 10 days ago. Of course, it also reminded me of a few South African stamps in my collection, issued over the years, one for François Pienaar, another for South African celebrations featuring the Web Ellis Cup, and the set of stamps commemorating the momentous event in 1995.
This set of 3 stamps and one souvenir sheet was issued on 25 May 1995 to commemorate South Africa hosting the 3rd Rugby World Cup.
This pair of stamps was issued on 28 June 1995 to celebrate South Africa winning the Rugby World Cup!
The French Post released in August a series of regional sheetlets with 10 self-adhesive stamps each featuring regional specialties. The stamp shown above is from the sheetlet for Aquitaine. The description for it listed "soule" or "sioule" as the ancestor of modern day rugby. I googled it, and discovered that "soule" is still being played in France, especially in Normandy, and there are almost no rules for it, one just have to bring the ball across the goal line, and there can be any number of players on either side. The game is supposed to been played more than a thousand years ago!
