2025 Rugby Premier League

In April 2025, the six teams were announced: Bengaluru Bravehearts, Chennai Bulls, Delhi Redz, Hyderabad Heroes, Kalinga Black Tigers and Mumbai Dreamers. World Rugby granted RPL a 15-day window, ensuring no other rugby sevens tournaments took place during this period. This allowed participation of some of the biggest names in the sport.^[4]

A lineup of 30 marquee international players from rugby powerhouse nations were bought during the auction. The broadcasting and streaming rights were sold to Star Sports and JioHotstar. Renowned coaches Mike Friday, Ben Gollings, DJ Forbes, Tomasi Cama, Francisco Hernández, and Tim Walsh were roped in for the league.^[5]

From the domestic circuit, 30 Indian players were selected from an auction pool of 71.^[6] Mohit Khatri, captain of the national rugby 7s team went for ₹4.5 lakh.^[7] Dream11 chief marketing officer Vikrant Mudaliar revealed that the platform, which has 240 million users, will launch a rugby fantasy sports category to coincide with the RPL.^[8]

The teams competed against each other during a 34-match schedule over 15 days.

• Rugby Premier League featured 2 matches per night on weekdays and 3 matches per night on weekends.
• Matches were 4 minutes a quarter + 2 minutes break between each quarter which meant 22 minutes per match.
• A round-robin format saw 30 pool games with each team playing 10 pool matches. There were two semi-finals, a bronze medal match and the finale for a total of 34 matches.
• Teams played a maximum of 10 pool games + 2 playoff matches over 15 days.^[9]

The matches were held at the Mumbai Football Arena, Mumbai, Maharashtra.^[10]

Mumbai
Mumbai Football Arena
Capacity: 7,000

Experienced marquee rugby players were picked up at the draft.^[11] The bridge and Indian players were bought at the auction.^[12]

Bengaluru Bravehearts	Chennai Bulls	Delhi Redz	Hyderabad Heroes	Kalinga Black Tigers	Mumbai Dreamers
Akuila Rokolisoa Iowane Teba Tone Ng Shiu Scott Curry (C) Pol Pla (C) Philip Wokorach Liam Poulton Mak Chung Mohit Khatri Suresh Kumar Karan Rajbhar Prashant Singh Arpan Chhetri	Terry Kennedy Joseva Talacolo Joaquín Pellandini Filipe Sauturaga Alex Davis (C) Nikias Lohe Haakon Oess Va'a Apelu Maliko Akhil Anand Shanawaz Ahmed Aryan Dixit Muhammed Jasim Vallabh Patil	Matteo Graziano Patrick Odongo Jordan Conroy Matías Osadczuk (C) Alejandro Laforga (es) Robin Plumpe Michael Coverdale Moritz Noll Rajdeep Saha Deepak Punia Mohit Tushir Sunil Chawan Raj Kumar	Kevin Wekesa Joji Nasova Terio Tamani Lautaro Bazán Manu Moreno (C) Motu Opetai Max Roddick Wolfram Hacker Prince Khatri Sumit Roy Javed Hussain Sukumar Hembrom Sambit Pradhan	Rosko Specman Lucas Lacamp Perry Baker Harry McNulty (C) Maurice Longbottom Kyle Tremblay Ethan Turner James Thiel Ajay Deswal Asis Sabar Deepraj Rajabhosale Pardeep Singh Arjun Mahato	Waisea Nacuqu Henry Hutchison Aaron Cummings Jerry Tuwai James Turner Elias Hancock Rhys James Briar Barron Neeraj Khatri Devendra Padir Akash Balmiki (C) Nayan Kumar Ganesh Majhi

Player	Team	Points
Va'a Apelu Maliko	Chennai Bulls	75
Akuila Rokolisoa	Bengaluru Bravehearts	69
Terio Tamani	Hyderabad Heroes	66
Philip Wokorach	Bengaluru Bravehearts	64
Joji Nasova	Hyderabad Heroes	52

Source

Player	Team	Tries
Va'a Apelu Maliko	Chennai Bulls	15
Philip Wokorach	Bengaluru Bravehearts	12
Joji Nasova	Hyderabad Heroes	10
Javed Hussain	Hyderabad Heroes	8
Terry Kennedy	Chennai Bulls	8

Source

Player	Team	Conversions
Terio Tamani	Hyderabad Heroes	18
Akuila Rokolisoa	Bengaluru Bravehearts	17
Maurice Longbottom	Kalinga Black Tigers	14
Filipe Sauturaga	Chennai Bulls	11
Joaquín Pellandini	Chennai Bulls	10

Source

Player	Team	Tackles
Max Roddick	Hyderabad Heroes	31
Manu Moreno	Hyderabad Heroes	30
Joseva Talacolo	Chennai Bulls	28
Michael Coverdale	Delhi Redz	27
Filipe Sauturaga	Chennai Bulls	27

Source