Trailfinders aim to be 'unstoppable' after 'clunky' start

Barney Maddison revealed a stripped back approach helped Trailfinders Women to log their first win of the new Premiership Women’s Rugby season.

Last weekend the head coach presided over his team’s 64-22 win over Sale Sharks in the North West. It was a dominant performance from the Londoners, who vanquished the memory of their 24-12 loss to Exeter Chiefs in the opening round of the new domestic season a fortnight earlier.

Maddison believes a lack of time together as a group played a significant factor in his team’s Round 1 loss as he handed debuts to offseason arrivals Meg Jones, Francesca McGhie, Georgia Ponsonby, Alana Borland and Rachel Malcolm.

That series of names aligning themselves with Trailfinders came as a major boost to the side, but could not get right into the swing of things after just days on the training paddock together following their 2025 Women’s Rugby World Cup exits.

“We, as a coaching group, gave too much information out in that first couple of weeks with the girls coming back from the World Cup,” Maddison said.

“We probably into that Chiefs game with the wrong game plan; we probably should have kept it a bit simpler. We pulled things back and that bye week allowed us to have an extra couple of sessions together as a group.

“You can have some really, really good players, but it is about how well they play together on the pitch. Them extra couple of sessions helped that massively.”

In each of her outings this season Ponsonby has made her way across the whitewash.

The 33-cap Black Ferns hooker arrived in West London in the wake of New Zealand’s third-place finish at the Women’s Rugby World Cup.

One of those players that has brought her immense experience to Trailfinders Sports Ground, she believes that more time together will aid the team’s development further.

“The first game just felt really clunky,” Ponsonby said. “We just couldn’t really get anything going. I feel like we knew why that was. It was obvious. I think anyone in the stands watching would have been like, ‘these girls look like they’ve never played together before’. Because we hadn’t.

“Going into the Sharks game and putting out that performance was a lot more reassuring and a bit of a relief knowing that’s what we’re capable of.

“We’ve got some stars in our team, and I think once we all gel even further and really sink into our game plan, I think we’ll be unstoppable.”

This weekend offers a chance for Trailfinders to get another win on the board. They host a Bristol Bears outfit who, like them, have won one and lost one to start the new domestic season.

For Maddison, off the back of two already contrasting 80 minute outings, he is hoping that his charges back up Round 3’s outing against Sale. Even if he is well aware that Scott Lawson’s team will provide stern opposition.

“It’s just a performance,” Maddison said. “I’ll back these girls to the hilt in that sense. We’ve got some fantastic players and as long as we go out there, put a performance together, I’ve no doubt we we’ll be in a good place at the end of the 80 minutes.

“It’s just about our performance. About us. We have to focus on ourselves. Bristol will be a very tough game. They’ve got a hell of a team. We’ll have to be at our best at the weekend.”