Italy will bid for the Rugby World Cup in 2015 or 2019, the Italian Rugby Federation (FIR) said on Sunday.

"At the moment we are waiting to have the documentation (from the International Rugby Board) with which to make our bid official," FIR president Giancarlo Dondi said in a statement.

"Successively we will be able to get to work on presenting the best project possible to the IRB in order to bring to Italy the world's third most important sporting event after the football World Cup and the Olympics."

The FIR said that the IRB would assign the 2015 and 2019 World Cups together in July 2009. New Zealand will stage the next tournament in 2011.

"It's an important decision, a new cornerstone in the development of Italian rugby which the whole movement should be proud of, regardless of what the IRB decides," Dondi said.

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