Australia have maintained their spots atop world men's and women's rugby league rankings, despite suffering defeats to their NZ rivals in the inaugural Pacific Championships.
NZ Kiwis inflicted a record 30-0 scoreline on the world champion Kangaroos in the tournament final at Hamilton in October, while the Kiwi Ferns toppled the Jillaroos 12-6 - their first victory since 2016 - to claim the women's title.
Those performances have not been enough to upset the established order, according to International Rugby League, which bases its rankings on the following criteria:
- Ranking points for each sanctioned international
- The bigger the win, the more points the winning team receive and the fewer points are awarded to the losers
- The higher the opponents' ranking, the greater the weighting of the result
- Games in official competition are weighted higher than bi-lateral arranged games
- More recent games are weighted higher than older games
- The rankings reward teams who are active and win games
While New Zealand prevailed in the Pacific Championships finals, the Aussies had beaten their counterparts earlier in the competition, with the Kangaroos overwhelming the Kiwis 36-19 at Melbourne just seven days earlier.
Kiwis captain James Fisher-Harris was rewarded for his performance with the 'Golden Boot' International Player of the Year award.
International Rugby League has heralded the 2023 calendar year as a success for the global game, despite the cancellation of the 2025 World Cup, after the United States and Canada withdrew as hosts, then France followed.
The event has been delayed a year and will be staged in the southern hemisphere, with a reduced men's field.
"In a nine-day period alone we had 23 sanctioned international matches, which was wonderful to see,” said IRL chair Troy Grant.
"We have the Pacific Championships up and running in the southern hemisphere, with Papua New Guinea as winners of the Pacific Bowl and New Zealand as winners of the Pacific Cup. We also had an historic tour by Tonga to England in the northern hemisphere, which was well won by England.
“The Kiwi Ferns upset the Jillaroos for the first since 2016, as well, and in the women’s game, we had 18 senior matches this year compared to 12 non-Rugby League World Cup matches in 2022.
“That is a 50 percent increase, which demonstrates the growth of the women’s game, with women’s matches in all four IRL regions."
After losing to Samoa in the 2022 World Cup semis, England have leapfrogged the Pacific Island team, which lost to Australia (36-12) and New Zealand (50-0), with Tonga ranked fifth.
Australia, New Zealand, England and Papua New Guinea fill the top four women's spots.
