“If the women’s game gets things right, it will be a different sport by the end of 2022”

Rugby’s most outspoken and inf luential journal ist

THERE ARE serious grounds for believing that the next 14 months will completely change the landscape of elite rugby for women. There is so much to savour in the plans for the future, culminating in the rearranged World Cup in New Zealand.

Before then, we will be able to watch the Black Ferns, the USA, Canada, England and France in action in the forthcoming autumn Tests. And with a year between then and the World Cup the stakes could well be enormous.

Furthermore, the growth in the profile of the Allianz Premier 15s has been marked, so much so that the great Leicester Tigers have partnered with Lichfield and have a clear intention to enter the English top flight at the earliest opportunity, which would be in two years’ time.

And perhaps the biggest boost of all? The Lions are conducting a feasibility study in