1989 Five Nations Championship 1989 Five Nations Championship The 1989 Five Nations Championship was the 60th series of the rugby union Five Nations Championship. Including the previous incarnations as the Home Nations and Five Nations, this was the 95th series of the northern hemisphere rugby union championship. Ten matches were played over five weekends between 21 January and 18 March. France won it with three wins and one defeat (against England), while no British team was able to win the Triple Crown. England entered the final round of matches knowing that a win would certainly clinch the championship, but were overturned in Cardiff as
The Rugby Championship than Italy and Ireland among the Six Nations teams. Australia and New Zealand first played each other in 1903. South Africa toured both nations in 1921 but there was never any formal competition between these teams, unlike the Home Nations (now known as the Six Nations Championship) in the Northern Hemisphere and the three nations only met sporadically. In the 1930s, Australia and New Zealand started contesting the Bledisloe Cup during rugby tours between the two countries. The final acceptance of professionalism in rugby union launched the Tri Nations concept - nearing the completion of the 1995 Rugby World Cup,