High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! The 1991 Rugby World Cup was the second edition of the Rugby World Cup, and was jointly hosted by England, Scotland, Wales, Ireland and France; at that time, the five European countries that participated in the Five Nations Championship making it the first Rugby World Cup to be staged in the northern hemisphere with England hosting the 1991 Rugby World Cup Final at Twickenham. Following on from the success of the inaugural 1987 Rugby World Cup there was a lot more attention and razzmatazz and was also seen for the first time as a major sporting event. Also for the first time qualifying competitions were introduced as the number of entrants had increased from sixteen nations four years before to a total of thirty-three countries, the eight quarter-finalists from 1987 qualified automatically with the remaining twenty-five countries having to qualify for the remaining eight spots. The same sixteen team pool/knock-out format was used with just minor changes to the points system. The Pool stage of the tournament was nothing like four years earlier with was fewer one sided matches and all sixteen teams fought hard to try and reach the quarter finals and produced two major shocks when Western Samoa, who were making their debut in the tournament and Canada (which to date is still their best performance at a Rugby World Cup) both qualified for the last eight. The biggest shock of the Pool stage with regards to the major teams was Wales who finished third in Pool 3 and were eliminated. The Quarter-finals sadly proved no match for either Western Samoa or Canada who both lost heavily to New Zealand and Scotland. England knocked out 1987 finalists France and Australia in what was seen as the match of the round piped Ireland 19-18 in a thrilling match at Lansdowne Road. The semi-finals produced two tight matches with England overcoming their rivals Scotland 6-9 at Murrayfield and Australia defeating the defending world champions New Zealand 16-6 at Lansdowne Road. The World Cup Final was played at Twickenham in London, and saw Australia triumph 12–6 against an England side that had suddenly abandoned their forward-based approach to play a running game.