''For divisional competitions, see: 2008 Asian Five Nations division tournaments'' The 2008 Asian Five Nations, known as the 2008 HSBC Asian 5 Nations due to its sponsorship by

HSBC HSBC Holdings plc is a British multinational universal bank and financial services holding company. It is the largest bank in Europe by total assets ahead of BNP Paribas, with US$2.953 trillion as of December 2021. In 2021, HSBC had $10.8 tri ...

, was the inaugural series of the newly formatted Asian

rugby union Rugby union, commonly known simply as rugby, is a close-contact team sport that originated at Rugby School in the first half of the 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand. In its m ...

tournament, the

Asian Five Nations The Asia Rugby Championship, or ARC, is an annual rugby union competition held amongst national rugby sides within the Asia Rugby region. The competition was originally known as the Asian Rugby Football Tournament when founded in 1969, and was call ...

. It is the flagship competition devised by the

International Rugby Board World Rugby is the world governing body for the sport of rugby union. World Rugby organises the Rugby World Cup every four years, the sport's most recognised and most profitable competition. It also organises a number of other international rug ...

to develop the sport in the Asian region. Ten matches were played over five weekends from 26 April to 24 May, with Japan winning all four of their games to become the first Asian Five Nations champions on 18 May 2008. Scoring system: 5 points for a win, three for a draw, one bonus point for being within seven points of the winning team, and one for four tries.

Teams

The teams involved, with their world rankings pre tournament, were: * (43) * (30) * (18) * (33) * (23)

Final table

*Bottom team, Arabian Gulf, are relegated to Division One for 2009 edition.

Fixtures

Report on JRFU website

References

External links

Japan Rugby Football Union
on itsrugby.co.uk {{DEFAULTSORT:rugby union

2008 File:2008 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Lehman Brothers went bankrupt following the Subprime mortgage crisis; Cyclone Nargis killed more than 138,000 in Myanmar; A scene from the opening ceremony of the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing; ...

Five Nations Five Nations

Asia Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an area ...

2008 in Hong Kong sport 2008 in South Korean sport 2008 in Kazakhstani sport