Adelle Ferrie: 'To be able to call rugby my job, I will not be resting on my laurels'

When Adelle Ferrie earned her seventh Scotland cap against Fiji during the Women’s Rugby World Cup earlier this year, she posted on social media that she was ‘proud to be part of the journey’.

And it has certainly been quite the journey for Ferrie over the last 12 months that’s for sure.

This time last year she was just about to win the Arnold Clark Women’s Premiership title with Corstorphine Cougars and head into her second season of the Celtic Challenge with Edinburgh Rugby whilst balancing her sporting endeavours with a full-time day job in an administration role at the Sheriff Court in the capital.

At that point her hope was to be named in the wider Scotland squad ahead of the 2025 Guinness Women’s Six Nations, but, midway through the Celtic Challenge competition, she was not sure if her form was good enough to merit a first ever call-up.

“I wouldn’t say I felt like I was standing out at that level by my own standards as we headed into 2025 so that dream to be in the Scotland training squad was probably just dwindling away a bit, especially with lots of good second rows around,” she explained.

“I kind of came to accept that I might not be part of Scotland’s plans, but then I got the call up and everything changed from there.

“I always felt like I needed to get to that position of training day in and day out to start being the better player I knew that I could be and, when I went into the environment, having so many good players around me just meant my game stepped up so much.”

With five minutes to go back at the end of March, the Scots were up 24-21 in the pouring rain as the opening Six Nations game at Hive Stadium in Edinburgh versus Wales was in the balance.

The then head coach Bryan Easson had no qualms about throwing Ferrie into the action off the bench for her debut.

Ferrie might have been nervous entering the fray, but if she was she did not show it and she managed to claim three lineouts to help the team get across the line.

“It was a very surreal moment for me that I had waited to happen for a while,” the player, who grew up in Newton Stewart in Dumfries and Galloway and started playing rugby while studying in Dundee for Morgan, Abertay University and Howe of Fife, stated.

“It was nice to get out there and earn my first cap in front of all the fans and my family and I was so happy that the coaches and the players trusted me to come on in a crucial moment when realistically Wales still could have had another chance to score.”

From that moment on Ferrie became a key part of the national squad and by the time the World Cup playing group was named in early August she had six caps from the Six Nations and the summer Tests under her belt and was going to England for the showpiece event.

Given that eight months before that she had never even trained with Scotland and that she was taking unpaid leave from her day job to take part in the World Cup, she admits that the squad announcement day in St Andrews was a bit of a ‘pinch me’ moment.

She was also 27 at the time, but she had backed herself and kept her international dream alive when others of a similar age might have thought that ship had sailed, something Ferrie deserves great credit for.

Another pinch me moment was to come for her a few weeks later when, after not being in the matchday 23 for Scotland’s 38-8 opening World Cup win against Wales, she was handed a place on the bench for the Fiji game in Salford.

“The World Cup was just an unbelievable experience and being told I was to be involved against Fiji was really exciting.

“I managed to get on late on as we won [29-15] and earlier in the day I’d also got to walk off the team bus with the match ball that we take with us everywhere which is from the first ever Scotland women’s Test in 1993 as well so that was really cool.

“That moment was the highlight of my World Cup experience without a doubt as only one person gets the honour of doing it each match.

“Rachel [Malcolm, the captain] stood up and said really lovely words about me before we got off the bus and it was very emotional and made my debut at the World Cup that much more exciting and memorable.

“I didn’t play against Canada or England [as the Scots went out at the last eight stage], but I’m just so grateful for the opportunity I had in terms of getting my first World Cup cap and everything that came with it.

“Just being in that environment for such a prolonged period of time has taught me a lot. Before earlier this year rugby was only ever something I did in the evenings after a full day at work, but after the World Cup and the months I’d spent in the squad I knew I wanted rugby to be more than that for me going forward.”

And rugby will be a bigger part of her everyday life going forward as recently Ferrie was named as one 35 female players who are receiving financial support for the 2025/26 season from Scottish Rugby.

28 of the 35 are being fully supported and she is one of the 11 of those 28 who is based in Scotland at the Oriam on the outskirts of Edinburgh.

As a result, she is now no longer working at the Sheriff Court and is currently preparing for the Celtic Challenge campaign with Edinburgh which starts later this month and, longer-term, she will hope to be in the Scotland Six Nations squad when the 2026 event begins in April.

“It’s surreal to think how far I’ve come in a year after having had one goal to play for Scotland and stuck at it for so long even when I doubted it would happen,” Ferrie, who has also now trained as a sports massage therapist and is running a practice in her spare time, concluded.

“But now that I have been capped by Scotland, been to a World Cup and am being supported by Scottish Rugby to be able to call rugby my job I will not be resting on my laurels.

“I see this as the start of something new and exciting and something that I’m going to give everything I have to because I have worked hard to earn this opportunity.”