Serbia national rugby league team

Rugby League was first played in Serbia in 1953 when it was introduced by Dragan Marsicevic, secretary of the Yugoslav Sport Association. Two French teams toured later that year, and in 1954 the clubs Partizan and Radnički were formed. These clubs played their first match on 26 April 1954. In 1961 a Yugoslav Rugby League team played its only game against a French Select XIII team in Banja Luka. The French team won 13-0. The sport died out soon afterwards not due to the communist regime banning the sport.

The rebirth of Serbian Rugby League Federation was on 10 November 2001 with the new federation been formed. There is now an eight team domestic competition between Dorcol Spiders, Morava Cheetahs, Red Star Belgrade, Belgrade University, Radnički Nova Pazova, Tsar Lazar, Soko, Stari Grad, and Niš.

Serbia has participated in the Mediterranean Cup competition in 2003 and 2004. Serbia won the 2006 and 2007 Slavic Cup after beating Czech Republic 36-28 in Prague and 56-16 in Belgrade, respectively.

See also 2008 Rugby League World Cup qualifying

Serbia failed to qualify for the 2008 Rugby League World Cup, losing to Holland, Russia and Georgia in 2006, to be eliminated from the qualification process. Serbia won the 2007 and 2010 European Shield tournaments, by beating both Germany and Czech Republic on both occasions. Serbia took part in then European 2nd tier competition Euro Med Challenge in 2008. After being defeated 4-30 by Russia in Novi Sad and 14-20 by Lebanon in Bhamdoun, Serbs finished third. Serbia was a participant in the 2009 European Cup, having been drawn in a group alongside Wales and Ireland.

Serbia participated in the 2013 Rugby League World Cup qualifiers in October 2011. They played games against Italy, Lebanon and Russia, but were defeated in all three matches and so were ultimately unsuccessful in qualification for the tournament.

Serbia participated in the inaugural Balkans Cup tournament held in their own country. Serbia finished second in the tournament after a defeat to Greece who had a full squad of Australian born players in the final.[1]

Serbia participated in the qualification for the 2017 Rugby League World Cup. The first stage of qualifying involved having to finish in the top three in their 2014–15 European Shield competition. During their qualification, Serbia created history after beating Russia for their first ever time on their eighth time of asking.[2]

The final qualification tournament will consist of six teams: the top three teams from the European B tournament, the winners of the European C tournament and seeded nations Wales and Ireland. The tournament will feature two groups of three teams playing in a single round-robin format. The winners of each group will qualify for the World Cup, while the runners-up faced each other in a play-off match on 5 November 2016 to determine the final spot. A seeded draw took place to determine the groups on 5 November 2015. Serbia were placed in Group A. They took on Wales on 15 October 2016, in Llanelli Wales and Italy in Belgrade on 22 October for a place in the 2017 World Cup.[3] In the lead up to the World Cup qualifiers, Serbia played Spain in Valencia and ran out 64-4 winners a dominant display in the first ever meeting between these two nations.[4] In the first World Cup qualifier against a Wales side full of Super League and Championship players, Serbia lost, 50–0, proving that there is still a long way to go but that there was some slight improvement from last time the two nations meet in 2009 when Serbia lost 88-8.[5] In the second and final game of World Cup qualifying Serbia needed victory over Italy to send them through to a one-game playoff against Russia but lost the game at the Maksis Stadium in Belgrade, 14–62, which was a result against an Italian team with many NRL and English Super League players who were Australians of Italian heritage.[6] On 10 November 2016, 15 years was celebrated since the re-forming of Serbian Rugby League a milestone occasion.[7]

Below is table of the official representative rugby league matches played by Serbia at test level up until 5 February 2016:

Opponent	Played	Won	Drawn	Lost	Win %	For	Aga	Diff
Bulgaria	1	1	0	0	100%	50	20	+30
Czech Republic	4	4	0	0	100%	204	54	+150
France	3	0	0	3	0%	12	206	-194
Georgia	2	0	0	2	0%	22	89	-67
Greece	3	1	0	2	0%	98	114	-16
Germany	6	5	0	1	83.3%	284	71	+213
Hungary	1	1	0	0	100%	50	0	+50
Ireland	1	0	0	1	0%	0	82	-82
Italy	6	3	0	3	50%	130	166	-36
Morocco	2	0	1	1	0%	24	78	-54
Netherlands	2	0	0	2	0%	36	54	-18
Philippines	1	0	0	1	0%	12	18	-6
Russia	9	1	0	8	12.5%	122	250	-128
Scotland	1	0	0	1	0%	0	86	-86
Spain	2	2	0	0	100%	86	24	+62
Ukraine	3	3	0	0	100%	114	22	+92
Wales	1	0	0	1	0%	8	88	-80
Total	48	19	1	25	38%	1,237	1,374	-137