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PWR

New PWR season condensed to aid England's World Cup bid

GLOUCESTER, ENGLAND - JUNE 24: Zoe Aldcroft (R) and Natasha Hunt co captains of Gloucester-Hartpury lift the trophy after their victory during the Women's Allianz Premier 15s Final between Gloucester-Hartpury and Exeter Chiefs at Queensholm on June 24, 2023 in Gloucester, England. Kingsholm Stadium has been rebranded as 'Queensholm' for the occasion. (Photo by David Rogers/Getty Images)

The conclusion of the 2024-25 Premiership Women’s Rugby (PWR) season has been brought forward by more than three months, in a move organisers said was designed to “help England win the Women’s World Cup”.

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It was confirmed on Tuesday that the new PWR campaign will get underway on Saturday, October 5th with the final scheduled for Sunday, March 16th – the day after the final round of Men’s Six Nations fixtures.

Starting the competition at the beginning of October will mean the opening rounds clash with the second edition of WXV and ensure clubs’ international players will be absent.

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However, it also means that the domestic season will be wrapped up before the 2025 Guinness Women’s Six Nations starts, allowing the England squad to focus on their title defence and home World Cup.

Women’s Rugby World Cup 2025 is scheduled to get underway in Sunderland on August 22nd, with the hosts the overwhelming favourites to claim the title for a third time at Twickenham on September 27th.

“We want to do all we can to help England win the Women’s World Cup, so this season structure was agreed after a very collaborative process with the RFU,” Chief Executive of PWR, Belinda Moore said.

“Kicking off in October we can all look forward to a brilliant final which takes place 24 hours after Super Saturday in the Men’s Six Nations, creating an unmissable weekend of rugby next March.”

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More added: “In the coming season having the Women’s Six Nations after the PWR final gives the Red Roses certainly over their five-week rest period, which means they will return to club action after the Women’s World Cup.”

Organisers also announced “an innovative set of pre-season matches” – branded as the PWR Up Series – which will take place across three weekends between September 7th – 21st this year.

“With the support of all of our clubs we have decided to play a short regional competition in September, so our players and clubs are ready to go for the start of the PWR season in October,” Moore said.

“Our clubs are starting to develop close, regional rivalries and we believe this is just what our players and clubs need before the league season kicks off.”

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2 Comments
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Brian 278 days ago

I think the season goes on too long anyway and this is a good move. Intrigued by the pre-season regional competition. I also think that playing during the WXV is the right call and will give more game time to up and coming players. It may also help briefly level out the competition for the teams lower down the table. Pleased that it is recognised that the Red Roses should have every assistance to lift the RWC in a rare home tournament. It will also help the other home nations plus Canada and USA who have a number of players in the PWR.

C
Courtney 280 days ago

Interesting move by the PWR executives. I initially thought the Red Roses were showing their hand early but many of the players who will be involved in RWC 25 are also involved in the PWR and other leagues around the world are quite short anyway.

I don’t think Belinda Moore will be impressed with the misspelling of her name further in the article.

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RedWarriors 3 hours ago
'Matches between Les Bleus and the All Blacks are rarely for the faint-hearted.'

“….after hyping themselves up for about a year and a half”


You see, this is the disrespect I am talking about. NZ immediately started this character assasination on Irish rugby after the series win “about a year and a half” before the RWC. We win in NZ and suddenly we are arrogant. Do you consider this respectful?

And please substantiate Ireland talking themselves up comment: for every supposed instance of this there is surely 100x examples of NZ talking themselves up?

We were ranked 1, but that’s not talking ourselves up. We were playing good rugby.


Re the QF: that was a one score match: if you say we ‘choked’ you are really saying that Ireland were the better team but pressure got to them on the day? That is demeaning to your own team and another example of disrespect to Ireland.


New Zealand:

-NZ’s year long prep included a wall defence that Ireland had not seen until the match.

-Insights on all players strenghts and weaknesses. The scrum coach said that he had communicated several times with Barnes about Porter. He also noted when Barnes was looking at Porter he was NOT looking at the NZ front row.

-A favourable draw meaning NZ would play Ireland in a QF, where Ireland would not have a knock out win under their belt.

-A (another) favourable scheduling meant that NZ could focus on the QF literally after the France match and focus on Ireland after they beat SA in the pool.


Ireland:

-Unfavourable draw: have to play the triple world cup champions with players having multi RWC knock out match winning caps in the QF, when Ireland DONT want to play a top 4 team.

-Unfavourable schedule: Have to play world no 5 Scotland 6-7 days before the quarter. Have to prepare for this which compares unfavourably with NZs schedule (Uruguay 9 days before QF). Both wingers get injured with no time to recover.

-Match: went 13-0 down but came back. Try held up brilliantly by Barrett and last play of the match saw Ireland move from their own 10 metre line to 10 metres from the NZ line.

Jordan himself said that the NZ line was retreating and someone needed to do something which was Whitelock.


Ireland died with their boots on. You saw the reaction from NZ after the whistle. Claiming Ireland choked is disrespectful to NZ and to a great rugby match. It is also indicative of the disrespect shown by NZ and fans to Ireland since 2022. We saw it in some NZ players having a go at Irish players and supporters after the whistle. Is that respect?

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