Australia’s Emily Chancellor said she wants women’s rugby union to make professionalism “our own journey” as officials launched plans to help make it a more competitive game globally.
The Women’s Six Nations was to conclude yesterday, with reigning European champions England facing France in a Grand Slam decider at Twickenham after press time last night.
England, whose only defeat in their past 35 Tests came against hosts New Zealand in the World Cup final in Auckland in November last year, have been utterly dominant in their opening four matches of the Six Nations.
Photo: Reuters
The Red Roses had scored 233 points and conceded a mere 15 going into yesterday’s game, with the feeling among many neutrals after last week’s 48-0 rout of Ireland one of relief that they had failed to pass the 50-point mark for the first time this season.
World Rugby hopes that its new Accelerate program of support for national unions, combined with the launch of the 18-team, three-tier WXV global competition in October, will lead to a more closely contested 2025 Women’s World Cup in England.
Chancellor, now playing for London club Harlequins, said it was important the women’s game retained its own identity.
“As a female athlete growing up, you have male role models,” said Chancellor, 31, speaking at the SportsPro Live conference. “I’ve always seen the male professional as the goal — fulltime rugby that’s the dream, full stop.”
“I think now: ‘How can we make this our own journey?’” she said. “What does ‘professional’ look like? Is it purely what we see already exists or is professional rugby?”
“It doesn’t have to be the same model as what the men do now,” she added.
World Rugby chief executive officer Alan Gilpin said that “rugby has this ethos of team first.”
“It’s very hard to be an individual star in rugby,” Gilpin said. “We’ve got to flip that on its head. The women’s game is a chance to do that because the structures are less embedded.”
Sarah Hunter retired last month after appearing in a women’s record 141 Tests — more than double the number Australia’s Wallaroos have played in their entire history.
“WXV is a really exciting opportunity to play more Test matches from a country that has gone many years playing six games a World Cup cycle,” Chancellor said. “You are going to have five good competitive games a year.”
World Rugby has yet to release figures regarding the amount of money it is to inject into the Accelerate program, but Sally Horrox, the global governing body’s chair of women’s rugby, said that the initiative would “cascade down to choice unions in the next one to three years.”
However, amid media reports of a lack of support for the women’s game among senior Irish rugby figures, Horrox warned that national unions would have to commit to minimum standards and investment levels.
“Without referencing Ireland specifically, anyone that works with us in that regard has to come to the table willingly,” she said. “Then we’ll make our choices and work with them on the right initiatives.”
An October launch of the WXV means it would overlap with this year’s men’s Rugby World Cup in France.
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