Rugby Football Union to get £15m benefit from 2015 Rugby World Cup

The Rugby Football Union has earned £15m from the surplus made by the 2015 Rugby World Cup.

The competition exceeded its revenue target of £250m, with around 2.47m tickets sold for the tournament.

That income covered the £80m that must be paid to World Rugby, leaving an extra £15m for English rugby union's governing body, said Stephen Brown, managing director of organiser England 2015.

Brown told BBC Sport: "From England 2015's perspective, this had been a huge success. Wembley Stadium twice broke the record for the biggest ever Rugby World Cup attendance, and football venues were a huge success and packed for every match."

World Rugby's chief executive Brett Gosper, meanwhile, said England's failure to advance from the pool stage "didn't make a dent" on the success of the tournament.

"It broke every record on every metric we've got - viewing audiences, number of tickets sold, commercial values, sponsorship," Gosper said.

Japan will host the tournament in 2019.