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Scottish Rugby confirm PWR interest: 'We look forward to continuing discussions'


EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND - APRIL 18: Emma Wassell of Scotland looks on as players of Scotland huddle during the Women's Guinness Six Nations 2026 match between Scotland and England at Scottish Gas Murrayfield on April 18, 2026 in Edinburgh, Scotland. (Photo by Ian MacNicol/Getty Images)
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Scottish Rugby are the latest union to confirm that they have expressed interest in a team joining Premiership Women’s Rugby.

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In March, PWR announced that they would be accepting expression of interest submissions to help “inform planning for the league’s competition structure” and were accepting bids from outside of England.

Scottish Rugby are the third union to announce that they have filed an expression of interest with PWR after the Irish Rugby Football Union and Welsh Rugby Union.

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Currently, the governing body oversee two domestic women’s teams competing in the Celtic Challenge competition, which also includes teams from Ireland and Wales.

In 2025/26 neither Edinburgh Rugby or Glasgow Warriors reached the semi-final stage of the six-team competition.

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A statement, released to Scotland Rugby News, said: “Women’s rugby in Scotland continues to build strong momentum, something already demonstrated through the growth of the Celtic Challenge, and as further conversations around the future of the game develop, we are considering opportunities that could accelerate that progress and strengthen the sport domestically.

“Following the expression of interest, we are excited by the potential opportunity to work with PWR and our Celtic Challenge partners.

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“We believe any future involvement could play an important role in advancing our long-term ambitions for women’s rugby in Scotland, supporting sustainable growth from grassroots through to the international game, and creating the best possible environment for players across the country.

“We look forward to continuing discussions with the hope that Glasgow and Edinburgh could be part of an exciting future.”

Scotland have a strong core of its national team that ply their trade in PWR. This includes the team’s captain Rachel Malcolm, as well as star players Emma Wassell, Helen Nelson and Rhona Lloyd.

After four games of the 2026 Guinness Women’s Six Nations the side are fifth in the table and have registered only one win under new head coach Sione Fukofuka.

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3 Comments
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BC1812 44 days ago

Surely the RFU aren’t stupid enough to finance the Scottish, Welsh and Irish national teams to play together. What happens to the minimum Red Roses qualified rule for each team? One of the purposes of the PWR is to provide a strong England side. We could be throwing away our financial commitment and advantage by shooting ourselves in the foot with our generosity. It would kill the other national leagues before they even started.

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Chris929 44 days ago

totally agree.When PWR launched it was stated that the main purposes of PWR was to grow the womens game in England,keep providing top players for England and to keep England as the worlds leading side. Right now the pathways look in a bad state-terrible results at u18/u20 level and very few english youngsters playing regularly in the PWR. Below the senior Red Roses all is not well. The RFU must switch its focus to the pathways ,strengthening them,making it a priority that more young english players are getting game time in the PWR. Playing in BUCS or lower leagues wont develop these players-they need to be playing at the highest level.We need to get as many as possible playing in the PWR. Instead the RFU is bizarrely deciding to help our rivals by possibly giving them teams in the PWR. They wont have english youngsters players for them-they will be the irish,welsh and scottish national teams basically-getting to play week in week out in the PWR. How does that help England?

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HitchikersPie 45 days ago

That’s all 3 Unions from the Celtic Challenge expressing interest. Presumably they all want to keep 2 teams, but there is a big difference from Wolfhounds who would probably be fine in PWR, and Glasgow/Edinburgh who are very much development sides.


Will be interesting to see what happens, the women’s game was the first to sort an international calendar; maybe they sort a British and Irish league too!

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