Japan Rugby League One

Uncommon card · No. 123883

Japan Rugby League One (Japanese: ジャパンラグビーリーグワン, romanized: Japanragubīrīguwan), formerly known as the Top League (Japanese: トップリーグ, romanized: Toppurīgu), is a rugby union competition in Japan. It is the highest level of industrial-professional rugby competition in the country. The Japan Rugby Football Union created the competition in 2003, by absorbing the Japan Company Rugby Football Championship. The chief architect of the league was Hiroaki Shukuzawa who strongly felt the urgency of improving Japanese domestic company rugby to a professional level which would allow Japan to compete more convincingly at Rugby World Cups. It is an industrial league, where many players are employees of the corporations owning the franchise. While the competition was known for paying high salaries, only the world-class foreign players and a small number of Japanese players played fully professionally. The delayed 2021 season was the final season of the Top League, with the JRFU adopting a new fully-professional...

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