Rugby League World Cup 2021: Meet RugBee the official mascot!

Meet RugBee the official mascot for the Rugby League World Cup 2021.

Get used to seeing RugBee about as it will be at all 61 games of the men's, women's and wheelchair tournaments.

Thousands entered a competition to design the official mascot and in the end it was impossible for judges to pick from the final two designs - so they merged them!

The winning entries were by nine-year-olds James from Halifax and Samuel from Manchester, who had their designs put together to create RugBee.

Two thousand children entered the competition to design this year's mascot

The winners were informed via a video message in a school assembly.

Samuel said: "Because I knew the finals were taking place in Manchester I thought it would be really fitting to have a bee and I thought it was something that would suit me and Manchester.

"I never thought I would win out of 2,000 entries, I was really gobsmacked. Being able to go to the final and being able to look at my mascot that I have created is just amazing."

Rugby was revealed as the mascot at Old Trafford in Manchester

The Rugby League World Cup in 2021 will be hosted by cities in England during October, after the competition was postponed last year because of the coronavirus pandemic.

Matches will take place in Manchester, London, Newcastle, Leeds, Middlesbrough, Sheffield, Hull, Coventry, Wigan, Huddersfield, Leeds, St Helens, Doncaster, Warrington, Leigh, Newcastle and York.

"We were delighted to receive so many brilliant mascot entries... and it was incredibly difficult to whittle down the entries to the final two," said Rugby League World Cup 2021 chief executive, Jon Dutton.

The winning mascot was unveiled at Old Trafford in Manchester where men's and women's finals will be played in a double headlining event on Saturday 19 November.