'We can't get bogged down by this defeat' - Hope Rogers reflects on Eagles loss

After a 69-7 loss to England’s Red Roses, USA Women’s Eagles prop Hope Rogers has set her sights on the team’s final two 2025 Women’s Rugby World Cup pool games.

To keep their hopes of reaching the knockouts alive the USA must now register wins against Australia and Samoa over the next two weekends. Failure to do so will send the team home early.

Over the course of 80 minutes at Sunderland’s Stadium of Light, of which Rogers was on the pitch for 66 minutes, the Eagles were pummelled by an Ellie Kildunne-inspired England and conceded 11 tries by the time Aimee Barrett-Theron’s final whistle blew.

It was a night strewn with errors from the North Americans, who conceded 17 turnovers and 12 penalties to compound any hopes they had against World Rugby’s top-ranked side.

“When you’re playing a world class team, when you make those mistakes, they punish you,” Rogers told RugbyPass.

“That’s what they did. But we knew that was coming and we knew we had to be accurate. On the day we just weren’t quite there.

“I have full belief in the squad still. Very much so. I have full confidence in us to take these learnings and move into Australia and Samoa.”

Knockout rugby is the minimum of what the USA are hoping for at this World Cup.

Two wins will be enough to claim second in Pool A and in Jo Yapp’s Wallaroos the Eagles are taking on a team they have experienced recent success against.

In 2024 their 32-25 Pacific Four Series win over the side marked a real turning point for the squad, although this year’s 27-19 defeat in Canberra does add some extra intrigue.

At full-time Eagles coach Sione Fukofuka and team captain Kate Zackary spoke about the need to keep momentum on their side. In a similar vein Rogers hopes to use the positive aspects of her team’s performance to their advantage.

“We can’t get bogged down by this defeat,” Rogers said. “It was a big scoreline, we are away from that, but the performance we had doesn’t always reflect that.

“In some ways it does, in some ways it doesn’t. We’re going to look at our performance. We’re going to learn from it, and we are really going to focus our attention towards Australia.

“We know we have to come away with the win there to make it to the quarters.”

Rogers is the most capped Women’s Eagles of all-time. The 32-year-old has seen plenty of iterations of the side over the years and has now taken part in fourth World Cup.

In May the Exeter Chiefs prop spoke to RugbyPass about her team’s desire to potentially go and win the World Cup as performances soared under Fukofuka.

Since the former Australia assistant’s arrival at the end of 2023, the side have gone on to compete for longer periods of games and that showcase win just over a year to go that marked the influence of Fukofuka’s influence on the squad coming to fruition with less than a year at the helm.

With some glimmers of good fortune coming from their loss to England, including the efforts of try-scoring lock Erica Jarrell-Searcy, Rogers believes that life beyond the group stages is out there.

“We have a really hard-working group of girls, and I couldn’t be more proud to be on this team and be a part of this team,” Rogers said. “I wouldn’t want to be on any other team.

“We’ve been grinding away for a very long time. We have staff and coaches in place now to get us where we need to go. We want that to happen here and now.

“Obviously today didn’t reflect that fully, but I have full confidence that the next game will for sure.”