Surrey Sports Park hails record breaking Women’s Rugby World Cup as a huge success
Friday 10 September 2010
The clean up operation is drawing to a close at Surrey Sports Park, Guildford after hosting the Women’s Rugby World Cup 2010 in England – the most successful tournament to date.
More than 30,000 fans attended the 17-day-tournament which culminated in New Zealand winning their fourth successive Women’s Rugby World Cup title, narrowly beating the hosts England 13-10 in front of 13,253 at the Twickenham Stoop – a record for a Women’s Rugby international fixture.
Records also tumbled at Surrey Sports Park, who hosted a total of 26 matches during the tournament and was the main training base and home to all 12 international teams, providing accommodation, catering, training, physiotherapy and social facilities in a hugely popular campus-style setup.
In total 468 players and officials were based at the multi-million pound facility for 3 weeks, a period which saw Surrey Sports Park’s 10 outdoor grass pitches used daily for training and preparation. Two £1 million state-of-the-art pitches were used for 5 live tournament matchdays, which even attracted 2 streakers.
Other interesting statistics emerged from the event catering team at Surrey Sports Park, which served players and officials over 31,500 meals over the duration of the tournament, including 25,000 eggs, 10,000 mushrooms, 6,000 bananas and nearly 30,000 yogurts.
Alongside record attendances, the Women’s Rugby World Cup received unprecedented broadcast and media coverage, with matches screened live in 127 territories to a potential audience of 227 million homes, smashing the previous tournament benchmark set in Canada four years ago.
Surrey Sports Park, Chief Executive, Jason Harborow, said: "The Women’s Rugby World Cup has been a magnificent tournament and it was a privilege to host the worlds. We were determined to offer a world class welcome and world class facilities. We did this and our contribution along with the RFUW and IRB ensured this was the biggest and best world cup ever. The event has enabled Surrey Sports Park to be profiled on a world stage and I am sure many more world class events will be hosted at Surrey Sports Park in the future."
Media Enquiries
Peter La, Press Office at the University of Surrey, Tel: +44 (0)1483 689191, or Email mediarelations@surrey.ac.uk