A senior figure at the RFU explained the organisation is planning to help fund 100 new artificial pitches in the next four years to ensure it can “future-proof” the sport.

While the Rugby World Cup may be over for another three years, the sport’s governing body in England hopes the tournament’s legacy lasts for decades to come.

More than £10million has already been invested into facilities at clubs and one of the areas the RFU is looking to develop now is artificial surfaces suitable for playing rugby, which each cost between £600,000 and £800,000.

The RFU plans to pay for 60 3G artificial pitches on existing rugby sites across the country which could be used by a host of clubs in the surrounding area.

Some schools and community groups would be allowed to use the facility for free and there would also be around 25 per cent of the time for commercial use to help cover the costs.

The governing body also intends to provide investment into other organisation’s 3G pitches, such as a university or council, where the RFU would be allocated dedicated times for rugby.

Steve Grainger MBE, the RFU’s rugby development director, said: “The analysis on turf pitches suggests that the overuse of pitches is significant and the weather pattern suggests we will be getting wetter and milder winters which make the pitches even more unplayable.

“Last weekend (January 16 and 17) a third of all league fixtures across the community game were postponed due to the weather and while it was more severe in the north, it was spread across the country.

“We also need to be conscious of what other sports of doing and the next generation are experiencing sports on artificial pitches.

“The next generation will expect their sport on artificial pitches and while many of us like to roll around on the muddy pitches, it is not necessarily what the future generations want and have a responsibility to future-proof the game.”

Grainger was speaking at Maidenhead RFC, who have a 3G pitch which was paid for by the RFU and their local council.

Now in its fourth season – having not had a single game called off during that time – the pitch is used every day by not only the club’s 1,000 members but also teams throughout the region – just that day Royal Grammar School from neighbouring High Wycombe had three of their matches on the surface.

Maidenhead RFC chairman Stephen Bough said: “It is a fantastic facility. Everyone who plays on it loves it and it works on every level in terms of the quality of rugby and availability.”

The RFU has already invested £10.6m into the facilities at 526 clubs and that money, along with additional funding from the teams themselves and other organisations, has helped transform clubs across the country.

“It has been inspirational to see how much of an impact fairly modest investment into our clubs has had,” Grainger added.

“Usually our model for facilities is that for every £1 that we put in as an investment, it creates a £2.50 project. So usually for £10m of investment we would expect to see a return of around £25m worth of investments. But what happened this time was we came in at more than £40m in project value.

“That tells us that the investment the clubs put in around the World Cup was more significant, the partnership investment they secured from local authorities and other partners have been more significant and there has been added value from what happened.

“Along with the usual improvements like pitches, floodlights, changing rooms and drainage, one of our biggest success stories is the Social Space Project.

“A number of clubs had a total revamp of the club environment which has helped bring in a different generation and demographic into our clubs, which is important because the revenue from that is critical to our clubs.”

“We had a great World Cup but we are not resting after what was a great tournament,” Grainger continued.

“The success measure for us is the next four years because by the time the 2019 World Cup kicks off in Japan we want to make sure we have stronger clubs, more schools playing rugby, more participants in the game and more matches being played.”