Perched on a tackle bag at the Wales Rugby Union high performance centre, props Gwenllian Pyrs and Sisilia Tuipulotu, and Kelsey Jones the hooker radiate a magical glow.
The front-three have anchored a Wales side that has enjoyed a perfect start to the Women’s Six Nations, their bulldozing performances emblematic of a squad that has been reinvigorated by the arrival of professional contracts.
The WRU, which for so many years refused to touch the women’s game with a bargepole, has even begun to put menstrual health front and centre of players’ training programmes, in a major first for a home union.
Pyrs, who was one of the so-called ‘original 12’ to pick up a contract when the WRU unveiled a dozen in January last year, was a sheepdog trainer the last time Telegraph Sport spoke with her, three years ago.
The 25-year-old would spend most of her week journeying between Ysbyty Ifan in the Conwy Valley of north west Snowdonia to train at the WRU’s leafy Vale Resort on the outskirts of Cardiff. Prys would make the routine eight-hour round trip three times a week, but those precious hours are now devoted to rugby.
“We’re like a family now – we’re so much closer than we were last year,” beams Pyrs. She might have been reaping the benefits of a contract for over a year, but it was only last month, following Wales’ opening-round win over Ireland, when the feeling of being a professional rugby player finally sunk in. “After the game, everyone ran onto the pitch, it was overwhelming,” she says. “There were loads of kids running around asking us for signatures. It was class.”
After the impasse between Wales men and the organisation over contracts earlier this year – not to mention the recent sexism scandal that engulfed the union, it is the women who are providing Welsh rugby with the feelgood factor it craves.
At 19, Tuipulotu is already being hailed as the game’s next superstar. She has zero regrets about deferring her psychology degree because of her rugby commitments and rightly so – in her player-of-the-match performance against Ireland, she scored a try and carried a phenomenal 21 times covering 92 metres in all.
It is a stat made all the more impressive given the teen sensation is still being moulded into a loosehead, having initially trialled in the position at last year’s World Cup in New Zealand. “I was open minded but I wanted to give it a go,” says Tuipulotu, who previously operated as a destructive second-row. “It was pretty scary at first, but the more and more I practised, the more I’ve gotten more comfortable with it.”
Jones, who is the bubbliest out of the three, cuts across her younger team-mate with the aura of a proud mum watching their child on sports day. “In all fairness, your first scrum as a prop was against Canada, who were ranked third in the world,” she says, matter-of-factly. “Your second one was against England, who are first in the world. And then you played New Zealand – the eventual champions – twice at the World Cup! Talk about throwing you in the deep end, look at you now!’”
During last year’s Six Nations, Jones was working shifts as a disability and inclusion coach within the rugby community in Gloucester. Now she is learning to embrace life as a full-time player. “On social media, I get tagged in a lot more things and there’s more news about me,” she says. “Rugby can be a career for young girls in Wales now, because we have the contracts. That’s what’s so exciting, we’re living the change and driving the standards on how this pathway could be.”
The latter point is an important one. All three came to the game late – Pyrs and Tuipulotu first picked up a rugby ball aged 16 – while Jones was 17. All three acknowledge the creation of a female top-flight equivalent to England’s Premier 15s is one of a number of long-term challenges for the WRU. Players are also yet to benefit from a bespoke maternity policy, while some are earning as little as £20,000.
On the pitch, there is the small matter of playing catch-up with England. Meetings between Wales and the Red Roses have morphed into David and Goliath contests in recent years but after two bonus-point wins against Ireland and Scotland, confidence is sky high ahead of the visit of four-time reigning champions England. So what would a respectable scoreline this time round?
“We’re not focusing on scorelines, but our performance,” says Jones, diplomatically. “It’s going to be a battle, but it will be exciting. “Mentally for me, England-Wales always gives you that extra fire in your belly.” You sense Wales’ front-row girl gang have never been better prepared to face off with their English rivals.
Article courtesy of
Source link
