Infotel Magazine | Edition 39 | April 2019

The Varsity Match takes place at Twickenham
Stadium, the home of English rugby. The men's
rugby match has been held here since 1921 and
after 137 matches, Oxford University RFC has
won 60 times with Cambridge University RFC just
ahead with 63 wins. Unusually for rugby, there
have been 14 ties. For the women, Cambridge
is slightly behind with 13 compared to Oxford's
16 victories in what is now one of the world's
biggest amateur women's rugby matches.
With a Twickenham audience of 25,000 and a
TV audience of half a million, the appeal and
excitement of both matches is not likely to wane
any time soon.
Diliff [CC BY-SA 3.0]
The other big sports event is the Boat Race on
the River Thames which will take place on
Sunday 7 April. Attracting a TV audience of
15 million and over a quarter of a million to
the banks of the Thames between Putney and
Chiswick, rivalry on the river between the two
blues is often intense!
The men's race dates back 190 years and
in that period there has been a dead heat,
two Oxford mutinies, disruption caused by a
swimming protester and the sinking of both
crews on several occasions. The women's race,
although dating back over 70 years, has only
been held on the River Thames since 2015. The
Cambridge women's crew are currently ahead of
Oxford by 43 wins to 30 while the light blues of
Cambridge men are leading 83 to 80 over the
dark blues of Oxford.
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