I was watching rugby other day and noticed through the game that there was a few capital letters above the team and I wondered, “What does BP mean in rugby?”.
It was The Rugby Championship of course, the All Blacks vs Wallabies, which is New Zealand vs Australia for people who don’t watch the game.
I first thought of what BP has meant normally to me, which is British Petroleum but why would they let companies advertise above the rugby teams scores on TV.
Then I was trying to think of some of the rules of rugby and if it stood for anything related to sin bin or yellow cards or similar.
No, nothing came to mind there. Then the penny dropped.
What does BP mean in rugby?
What does BP mean? BP in rugby union means Bonus Point.
I just hadn’t ever noticed for some reason the two letters sitting above the team scores or to the side of the team scores on TV coverage before.
You think I would have noticed by this time from the amount of tries the All Blacks score per match.
The bonus point isn’t added to the total points in the game but added to the team’s ladder total for the tournament.
Currently there are two ways you can get a bonus point in The Rugby Championship and in other rugby competitions around the world.
A bonus point in rugby is given when a team scores over four tries in a game and the other is when a team loses by seven points or fewer.
It is possible for a rugby team to win the game, get four points for winning and then get an extra bonus point by scoring four tries or more.
Also, a team that loses by less than seven, but still scores four tries can earn themselves two bonus points for a game too.
Double bonus points for eight tries?
No, not currently, a winning rugby team doesn’t get two bonus points when eight tries are scored.
A winning rugby team can only earn themselves four points for a win and an extra one bonus point for scoring four tries and over
When were bonus points introduced in rugby?
The bonus points system in rugby union was originally introduced in the New Zealand rugby domestic competition in 1995.
Bonus points were then approved for the original Super 12 Rugby Championship in 1996, then used at the Rugby World Cup from 2015 and finally rolled out into club and international rugby competitions after this year.
Bonus points for all
I have just finished watching another rugby match here in Vietnam between the All Blacks vs Wallabies and both teams received bonus points for scoring more than four tries.
The BP Bonus Point popped up again on the scores in the left hand corner of the TV again but this time next to the team names.
So it depends on the broadcaster and the graphics they are using whether you’ll catch a glimpse of the BP bonus points sitting next to your teams name.
Well you would be hoping that they are earning bonus points, if not, they aren’t scoring tries are they!