The Rugby World Cup has, once again, been an absolute thrill-ride.
France have been superb hosts of the 2023 tournament, with South Africa looking to defend their crown from 2019 as they face New Zealand in the final – with both the Springboks and All Blacks looking to become the first nation to win four World Cups.
No northern hemisphere side, other than Jonny Wilkinson-inspired England in 2003, have lifted the trophy and that will remain the case, with hosts France and world No.1 side Ireland both exiting the tournament earlier than many expected.
But what about that trophy the winning captain will hold aloft? The Sporting News explores the story behind it.
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Who was William Webb Ellis?
William Webb Ellis has a lot to answer for. In most school environments, a flagrant rule-breaker would likely receive a stern talking-to and be banned from more jovial, light-hearted subjects – like physical education, perhaps.
For the eventual clergyman born in Salford in 1806 though, an act of notoriety in his late teens instead saw him inadvertently create a global sport, when he caught a football during a match and, rather than kicking it, ran forward with the ball in his arms.
There is no concrete evidence to confirm that these events did actually happen, but it's a bit late to change the origin story now, given that the sport of rugby – both union and league variations – takes its name from the school Webb Ellis attended at the time: Rugby School in Warwickshire.
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Four days out from the opening match, Nick Bentley breaks down the big four contenders that could be lifting the Webb Ellis Cup on 28 October.
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The Webb Ellis Cup
In the 200 years since these events, there's been plenty of change in sport and wider society, but Webb Ellis' legacy has lived on to the extent that he is seen as the founding father of Rugby Union, and the most sought-after prize the game has to offer bears his name.
The Webb Ellis Cup, awarded to the winner of each Rugby World Cup since the tournament's inception in 1987, has been hoisted aloft by players from four nations (New Zealand, Australia, South Africa and England), but the trophy itself has a history pre-dating the World Cup by more than 80 years.
The cup's creation came back in 1906 at Garrad's Workshop in London; cast in silver and gilded gold based on a previous design from 1740, the cup was kept vaulted at Garrad's for much of the next 80 years.
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Webb Ellis and the Rugby World Cup
In 1987 though, the eight-decades old trophy would finally get its calling card. The International Rugby Board had greenlit their inaugural World Cup in 1986 to kick off the next year, and the following February, John Kendall-Carpenter and Bob Weighill, two ex-England forwards working at the IRB, ventured to Garrad's in need of a prize befitting of world champions.
They were shown the trophy there and then, and after approval from Irish, Welsh, New Zealand and Australian representatives, the Webb Ellis Cup was named and purchased, to be awarded to the winner of the Rugby World Cup. A few months later, New Zealand captain David Kirk lifted the trophy as the All Blacks won the first tournament on home soil.
Since then, seven captains have held the trophy as world champions, with All Black Richie McCaw the only player to have done so twice (in 2011 and 2015). Famous faces have done so too, most notably South African president Nelson Mandela, who united the Rainbow Nation in handing the cup to Springboks skipper Francois Pienaar in 1995.
Another South African, Siya Kolisi, is the latest man to lift the 117-year-old trophy, in 2019. And he could match McCaw's feat of lifting it in two successive tournaments if the Boks beat the All Blacks on Saturday in Paris.
But with the 2023 Rugby World Cup final just days away, could the Webb Ellis Cup be destined for another pair of hands in New Zealand's Sam Cane? Whoever does it will, like William Webb Ellis, have their named etched into immortality.