Mapping the 2023 Rugby World Cup

Rugby, a global game?

Author

Affiliation

Julien Migozzi, PhD

University of Oxford

These interactive maps the place of birth of each player participating in the 2023 Rugby World Cup*:

The first map displays all players;
the second allows to focus on a particular team, for which a few stats and the list of players is available too.

While 20 teams participate in the competition, players come from 33 countries, many international players represent a country different than their place of birth. This globalization of rugby reflects two main processes: the expansion of rugby through colonial networks over the 19th century, and the recent professionalization of the sport which created a global market for players since the late 1990s.

Enjoy the exploration - and Allez les Bleus** !

All players

players = JSON.parse(wc_str) 
import {view} from "@neocartocnrs/geoverview"
geo = require("geotoolbox@2")
bertin = require("bertin")
cartoLight = "https://{s}.basemaps.cartocdn.com/light_all/{z}/{x}/{y}@2x.png"
cartoAttr = `&copy; <a href="http://www.openstreetmap.org/copyright">OpenStreetMap</a>, &copy; <a href="https://carto.com/attributions">CARTO</a>`

VanCircleFoodMap = {

  let width = 800;
  let container = DOM.element('div', { style: `width:${width}px;height:${width/1.6}px` });
  
  yield container;
  
  // Did not use setView because we are using "fit bounds" to get the polygons to determine this
  let map = L.map(container, {
  
  maxBounds:[[-90,-180],[90,180]]
 
});

  //add base layer
  let baseLayer = L.tileLayer(cartoLight, {
   attribution: cartoAttr,
    subdomains: 'abcd',
    maxZoom: 20,
    minZoom: 0,
    noWrap: true
    

  }).addTo(map); 

  //geoMarker obj
  let geojsonMarkerOptions = {
    radius: 5,
    fillColor: ~team,
    color: "#ff7800",
    weight: 1,
    opacity: 1,
    fillOpacity: 0.6
  };

  //passing a pointToLayer function in a GeoJSON options object when creating the GeoJSON layer. 
  //This function is passed a LatLng and should return an instance of ILayer, in this case likely a Marker or CircleMarker.
  //we use arrow notation here, but this essentially is the same as using an anonymous function like so: function (feature, latlng){...return stuff}
  let VanAreasLayer = L.geoJSON(players, {
      pointToLayer: (feature, latlng) => {
        return L.circleMarker(latlng, geojsonMarkerOptions);
    }})
  .bindPopup(function (Layer) { 
    return Layer.feature.properties.player +
    '<br> Place of birth: ' + Layer.feature.properties.birth_info +
    '<br> Position: ' + Layer.feature.properties.position +
    '<br> Team: ' + Layer.feature.properties.team; 
  })  
  .addTo(map);


  //finds bounds of polygon and automatically gets map view to fit
  map.fitBounds(VanAreasLayer.getBounds()); 
  
}

Select a team

Map of players

viewof text = Inputs.select([ "New Zealand", "France" ,  "Italy",     "Uruguay" , "Namibia"  , "South Africa", "Ireland" ,  "Tonga"  ,  "Romania" ,  "Wales",  "Australia","Fiji"  , "Georgia" ,"Portugal", "England", "Scotland",   "Japan" , "Argentina",  "Samoa", "Chile"], {value: "France", label: "Select a team:", sort: true})


newplayers = geo.filter(players, (d) => d.team ==  text)


VanCircleFoodMap2 = {

  let width = 800;
  let container = DOM.element('div', { style: `width:${width}px;height:${width/1.6}px` });
  
  yield container;
  
  // Did not use setView because we are using "fit bounds" to get the polygons to determine this
  let map = L.map(container);

  //add base layer
  let baseLayer = L.tileLayer(cartoLight, {
   attribution: cartoAttr,
    subdomains: 'abcd',
    maxZoom: 20,
    minZoom: 0
  }).addTo(map); 

  //geoMarker obj
  let geojsonMarkerOptions = {
    radius: 5,
    fillColor: "#ff7800",
    color: "#ff7800",
    weight: 1,
    opacity: 1,
    fillOpacity: 0.6
  };

  //passing a pointToLayer function in a GeoJSON options object when creating the GeoJSON layer. 
  //This function is passed a LatLng and should return an instance of ILayer, in this case likely a Marker or CircleMarker.
  //we use arrow notation here, but this essentially is the same as using an anonymous function like so: function (feature, latlng){...return stuff}
  let VanAreasLayer = L.geoJSON(newplayers, {
      pointToLayer: (feature, latlng) => {
        return L.circleMarker(latlng, geojsonMarkerOptions);
    }})
  .bindPopup(function (Layer) { 
    return Layer.feature.properties.player +
    '<br> Place of birth: ' + Layer.feature.properties.birth_info +
    '<br> Position: ' + Layer.feature.properties.position +
    '<br> Team: ' + Layer.feature.properties.team; 
  })  
  .addTo(map);


  //finds bounds of polygon and automatically gets map view to fit
  map.fitBounds(VanAreasLayer.getBounds()); 
  
}

data1 = geo.properties.table(newplayers)

Composition of the squad

Plot.plot({
  width: 800,
  height: 500,
  marginTop: 50,
  marginLeft: 100,
  marginBottom: 10,
  x: {
  label: "Country of birth", 
  axis: "top",
  tip: true,
  tickRotate: 0
  },
  y: {
  label: "Number of players",
  grid: true
  },
  marks: [
      Plot.barX(data1, Plot.groupY({x: "count"}, {y: "country", sort: {y: "x", reverse: true}})),

    Plot.ruleY([0])
  ]
})

List of players

The table displays only players for which the place of birth was available on Wikipedia.

Inputs.table(data1,)

Some general stats of the RWC

These numbers should be taken with caution due to missing data, especially for a few teams (see below)

Quality of information

*The data was sourced from Wikipedia and is sometimes incomplete.

When available, the place of birth was extracted from this page, then geocoded with OpenStreetMap. 591 players have been geocoded for a total of 675 players.

Data is incomplete for a few countries, especially for Chili and Portugal: sometimes there is no wikipedia page for the player, or the place of birth is not mentioned.

**Sadly, it not go as I hoped for. But congratulations to South Africa.