Innholdsfortegnelse for December 2025 i Rugby World

Split loyalties STEVEDIAMOND had the self-awareness to foresee that Red Bull might want a big name to replace him at Newcastle. But even the wheeler-dealer of the Gallagher PREM can’t have been expecting to be jettisoned one game into the new season. It was a savage wielding of the axe by the Austrian energy drink company. Former England U20 boss Alan Dickens has stepped up to head coach. Above him comes Neil McIlroy, most recently sporting director at league side Catalan Dragons, as sporting general manager. Former Ulster CEO Jonny Petrie has joined as managing director. John Fletcher, a popular former England U18 coach, has left his job as SRU head of pathways to be the side’s academy and pathways director. Notably, however, Newcastle’s press release conveniently omitted any detail…

What’s the club called? Staines RFC. They’re nicknamed the Swans and also known as The Vanish. We’ll let you work that one out… Where is home? The Reeves on Snakey Lane in Feltham has been home since the 1960s. Snakey Lane is a phenomenal name for a stadium, if we do say so. How did the club start? It was formed in 1926. In 1939-40, they played as Buccaneers RFC, a combined team with Ashford RFC (Middlesex). In 1946 Staines and Ashford amalgamated and have played under the Staines RFC name ever since. The club later purchased land in Feltham and relocated from Staines in 1964. What sides does the club have? The mini and youth section offers rugby from four years old to U17. Girls’ rugby starts at U12s.…

“YOU CAN GET THREE POINTS SIMPLY IF A PROP SLIPS OVER IN A SCRUM ON HALFWAY” RUGBY’STHREE-POINT penalty kick recalls an old Irish joke where travellers ask an old guy on the roadside how to get to Connemara. He replies, “Well, I wouldn’t start from here.” If we were designing the rules of rugby from scratch, it’s hard to imagine we would award kicks at goal for almost all infringements. Nor would we give so many points for a penalty compared to a try, the main object of the game. The problem is only partly the three to five/seven ratio. Even more problematic is the fact you can kick a penalty from anywhere. Football and field hockey have a penalty zone, as do basketball and water polo. American Football doesn’t…

THE KIT COLLECTION IHAVE VIVID memories of the 2007 Springbok side, writes Joe Robinson. The World Cup was across the Channel in France and for my 13th birthday earlier that year, my dad had bought us tickets to watch South Africa play Tonga in the pool stage in Lens; a quick day trip via P&O Ferries to the industrial French city to watch the likes of Victor Matfield, Percy Montgomery and my personal favourite, captain John Smit. For lunch, my dad took me to every 13-year-old’s favourite restaurant, McDonald’s. I had ‘Le Big Mac’. I remember the walk from the town centre to the ground taking in a maze of high-banked tunnels, a situation, even in my youth, I knew would have been far more intimidating for visiting football fans.…

WOMENTUM. THE word to best describe the 2025 Women’s Rugby World Cup. From the very first game on the banks of the River Wear in Sunderland, this tournament was always going to be about momentum. England won this tournament and did so under a level of pressure that women’s rugby – not just this team – had never previously experienced. And this team, led by the imperious Zoe Aldcroft, did so because of momentum. That unstoppable force of belief and ability that allowed 32 young women to capitalise on the opportunity of a lifetime at a record-breaking, life-changing moment which will change the face of women’s rugby forever. This is the story of how the biggest-ever Women’s World Cup was won… Competitive fixtures were always going to be hard to…

TO CELEBRATE turning 21 in late August, Gloucester prop Afolabi Fasogbon spent the evening in very similar fashion to how he spent his summer – eating Argentinian steak. “I celebrated my 21st birthday in Reading recently with my partner Bel and my mum, dad and brothers. We went to Buenasados, a lovely Argentinian steak-house chain. I’ve been to the Reading, Walton and Bristol branches,” Fasogbon tells Rugby World. “My missus met my mum and younger brother for the first time. It went well. She had already met my dad at Gloucester games.” While the ribeyes and sirloins of Buenasados in Reading may not have been quite the same as La Plata, it was a continued taste of an exciting summer for Fasogbon, who found himself on last-minute Test duty in…

AT HARLEQUINS, Marcus Smith is rarely seen without his mate (mah-teh) thermos, sipping the bold, earthy South American drink that’s become a ritual. He owes his love for mate to former Argentine team-mates and now shares it with Rodrigo Isgró, the dynamic Puma winger who joined last season. For Isgró, mate is more than a caffeine boost – it’s a bond to his Mendoza roots and a bridge to team camaraderie. “Yes, I introduced him to mate,” says Martín Landajo, the former Quins and Puma scrum-half, proud to open a new door for Smith. “He slowly embraced it and it’s now part of his daily routine.” Mate is a part of Argentine traditions and drinking it with friends is a constant bonding experience. This season, Smith will have a larger…

FRESH OFF the back of a tremendous World Cup in England, Premiership Women’s Rugby returns to keep the party going. The 32 Red Roses and wider cast of international stars will return to their club sides as Gloucester-Hartpury, and their eight World Cup winners, go in search of a remarkable fourth successive PWR title. The Cherry & Whites are sure to be in the mix again this year. But with other teams strengthening in the off-season, most of the clubs in the league will fancy their chances of making the final at the Twickenham Stoop next June. It should be a cracking campaign. Ahead of the season, read on for Rugby World’s preview of all nine teams and what to expect from them in the months ahead……

AURA DELGADO DUEÑAS has put the pen down, at least as an international player. Ten years after making her debut for Spain, the prop has retired from Test rugby following the 2025 World Cup, with her club farewell with Harlequins set for the end of the upcoming PWR season. After 53 caps, 14 clubs, two World Cups and several trophies, ‘Bimba’ is facing a new chapter. “My focus will be on growing rugby not only in Spain but in other countries and regions as well,” the 35-year-old explains. “I learnt that my role as captain went beyond the pitch; I had to be there for my team-mates, to inspire and motivate them, to hear their worries and help them face their own challenges. I want to keep helping players and…

AS THE final whistle went in the recent Women’s Rugby World Cup, I was overcome with sadness. A sadness because it was all over. For five weeks, I travelled up and down England watching various matches and it was probably the most enjoyable experience I’ve ever had in rugby. International rugby reached new locations. From the relentless positivity of fans in the stands to the willingness and pleasantness of players from around the world to talk to you about rugby, it was a pleasure to be a part of. It was a reminder as to why I love this game. And as Red Roses coach John Mitchell said, “This is only the end of the first book, there are many sequels to come.” The PWR starts this month – see…

“I GOT involved in a pub, The Dock in Canberra, in 2014, about four years before I retired from playing and we had a big event in July on the day the Brumbies played the Lions. “We had about 500 supporters there and bussed them up to the ground for the match. It has been an amazing stepping stone but I’m lucky to have great business partners who run it full-time. “A running club started six years ago at the pub, which has exploded into Running for Resilience (R4R), a mental-health initiative. I work for that one day a week and do well-being keynote speaking the rest of the time. “When I retired, I was doing it really tough and a mate got me involved in Parkrun, which really helped…

WHEN LOUIS Rees-Zammit announced he was leaving, I messaged him to say, ‘All the best pal, hope it works out for you and enjoy it’. He took a bit of stick at the time. But it’s his career and his life; if that’s what he wants to have a go at then why not. He’s gone and done something different. It wasn’t a risk for him as he was still young enough to come back as we’ve seen – and plenty of clubs tried to sign him. He has got that profile. When he left, he was a world-class winger, a Lion who delivered. It hasn’t worked out the way he would have liked. He’d have wanted a proper game in the NFL and a full spot on the roster.…

How did you get into rugby? Watching my dad play for St Mary’s RFC in Ireland. I don’t remember what level it was but I know he won a cup and a Leinster title. I have a faint memory from the same time of being in the old Lansdowne Road but I was in a pushchair. Ireland were playing Argentina. We were a big rugby family, so I was brought up in the rugby club. Big pots of crubeens – pigs’ feet. My mum and family friend Eva were in charge of them. We’d be in the club ballroom kicking plastic orange balls about. Who was your rugby hero? I see him all the time, Tony Ward. I loved him. Back in the day you were either an Ollie Campbell…

PICKING A team of the tournament is always a thankless task. In reality, we could have selected 14 Red Roses and Canada’s Sophie de Goede. After all, if you’re a team on a 33-game winning streak, it must count for more than just winning the World Cup, right? The seven Englishwomen we’ve selected represent that full squad effort. Elsewhere, the world was introduced to Kiwi dynamite in Braxton Sorensen-McGee and Jorja Miller. Evidence that the sky is the limit when you’re introduced to professionalism from an early age. Scotland’s Fran McGhie proved herself one of the best finishers in the game while Fijian centre Josifini Neihamu was a joy to watch. Meanwhile, Canada coach Kevin Rouet gets the nod for drilling his team to have the quickest ruck speed ever…

TANIELA TUPOU was a viral internet sensation in the days before it was cool. From a tiny village in Tonga, the tighthead tyro was spotted by Sacred Heart College in Auckland when he played against them on a Tonga U12 and U14 tour. However, the rampaging No 8 – as he was then – didn’t speak any English, so he wasn’t keen on the move. With the promise of a better life, his mother and brother convinced him to accept the scholarship and off he went. Before long, Tupou – who was originally nicknamed ‘The Rhino’ by kids at school before the moniker ‘The Tongan Thor’ stuck – was scoring sensational tries on live-streamed games with a bumper highlights reel that caught the attention of the rugby world. He played…

AS I sat among the Gods at the Brighton & Hove Albion Stadium during the half-time interval of the Black Ferns v Ireland match, I poked my nose over the press gantry to see what the racket was all about. A deafening chorus of Bon Jovi’s Livin’ on a Prayer was rattling around the 32,000-seater stadium, which was full but for a few seats here and there. Immediately below my position was a young girl, probably ten years old at most. Her grin was one usually reserved for felines from the Cheshire area. Her cheeks glowed with a four-leaf clover on one and the Irish tricolour on the other. Belting out the hair rock classic, she was in heaven. Her mum sat next to her with a New Zealand scarf…

HOMAS CLARKSON has been learning from two stellar international props in Ireland’s Tadhg Furlong and France’s Rabah Slimani at Leinster. But in a parallel universe, it’s another Six Nations legend in Martin Castrogiovanni that he would have been trying to emulate. Clarkson’s mother Nina Cafolla hails from the Italian village Casalattico, 70 miles south-east of Rome. She has even christened her son Tommaso. And at the start of the 2023-24 season, the Azzurri came knocking for their man. At the time, Clarkson, now 25, had yet to get his big break, so it was a soft no. But he kept the door ajar. “They came looking for me, but I’d just signed a new contract with Leinster,” Clarkson says. “It had gone quite well, so I kind of pushed it…

What’s the first game you went to? ENGLAND V IRELAND at Twickenham with my dad, sitting on wooden seats. Rory Underwood scored in the corner and I fell in love. Then I saw Jonah Lomu play France in Paris and that was me hooked. First rugby hero? CHRIS OTI, ENGLAND WINGER! Favourite player by a mile. I absolutely loved him and was nothing like him as a player. I pretended to be him while playing at school. First rugby boots? HI TEC HIGH TOPS. My dad used to clean them for me. I wanted Diadoras or Adidas Copa Mundials but they didn’t have studs and you couldn’t scrummage in them. First moment you realised you could make it? ARRIVING AT SARACENS as an 18-year-old out of school and doing live…

1 SOUTH AFRICA Regulating both tackle height and ball-carrier behaviour can reduce serious injuries, new research suggests. The study, by SA Rugby’s BokSmart programme, found that front-on tackles accounted for 71% of tackler and 53% of ball-carrier catastrophic head/neck injuries from 2008-23. Law trials in SA amateur rugby since 2024 outlaw above-sternum tackles and carriers bending into contact. “We’ve seen encouraging new data,” says Dr Wayne Viljoen. 2 DENMARK Denmark played a first official women’s Test in 20 years. Ten months after an unofficial match v Norway, the Valkyries earned a 15-15 draw in Latvia after tries by Alma Mandrup and Nina Vistisen (two), who coaches Denmark’s women’s sevens team. “We almost exclusively play sevens in Denmark, so XVs is new to almost everyone on the team,” says captain Malou…

“I HATE IT WHEN PEOPLE ARE UP THEMSELVES AND SCREAMING IN THE OPPOSITION’S FACE” What’s the funniest thing you’ve seen or heard on the pitch? This is actually something I’ve done. We were playing Canada and they were doing a maul in the middle of the field; I was coming around to hit the maul to try and stop it, I slipped onto my stomach and the maul ran completely on top of me. It’s quite a funny clip. What really annoys you? People love this but smack talk. I don’t mind banter, but I hate it when people are up themselves on the field and screaming in the opposition’s face. Just that cockiness. What’s the silliest thing you’ve ever bought? Oh God, I’m such a shopaholic. The one thing…

MILITARY RUGBY was represented at the Women’s Rugby World Cup by the likes of the RAF’s Amy Cokayne and Sarah Bonar, and Army Guardsman Manuqalo Komaitai, who turned out for Fiji. But a whole lot more serving personnel could be seen on English playing fields as the second Women’s International Defence Rugby Competition (IDRC) took place in late summer. IDRC 2025 was an eight-team tournament, with the UK, Ireland, France, Australia, Fiji, Tonga and Zambia being joined by a scratch Vodafone LooseHeadz side to provide two equal pools. All the teams stayed at Sandhurst and travelled to clubs in the region. Zambia were the outlier. In the land of short holidays, USA players couldn’t take three weeks’ leave to participate. But Mark Drown, head of the charity USA Military Rugby,…

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“THOSE WHO WANT OWEN FARRELL TO FAIL SHOULD BEWARE. BETTER TO ENJOY HIM WHILE WE STILL CAN” The Saracens and England great has more class in one fingernail than the naysayers who denounce his achievements, says Stephen Jones OWEN FARRELL is back in England and in English rugby, and back in the Saracens jersey after one season away. You are tempted to shout that everybody should duck. At this stage we can nail some colours to the mast. I have reported on England for many years, seen them weak or boring at fly-half. Farrell is one of the most significant English players of the past 50 years, one of the toughest mentally and physically; one of the best goalkickers, especially when the kick is critical, and a magnificent tactician at…

THE ASHTON Gate faithful will have been licking their lips over the summer. Not only do Bristol already have the most electrifying attack in the league – having led the way for carries, offloads, defenders beaten and initial breaks last season – they have nabbed two of the most exciting names to put pen to paper in the Gallagher PREM: Welsh flyer Louis Rees-Zammit, fresh from his stint in the NFL, and Kiwi-Scot Tom Jordan. Now Bears DoR Pat Lam may have been keen to outline through the off-season the team’s defensive frailties as the reason they were unable to reach a first-ever PREM final last season, losing in the semis to eventual winners Bath. But in making those two marquee signings, it shows Bristol have no intention of slowing…

BY SOME happy accident, the top two leagues in English rugby union have both had similar rebrands this summer. Both have shorn seven letters from their names. Premiership becomes PREM – excited capitals is the style – and Championship becomes Champ, no capitals. It’s almost unbelievable that we are told this shift at the same time was coincidental. Almost. The RFU’s slashing of secondtier funds has been well covered but Champ Rugby’s relaunch is a nod to the old days. We have 14 teams and proper play-offs. Get yourselves in the top six and you have got a puncher’s chance. Of what exactly remains to be seen because as we headed to Ealing for the league’s launch, all the talk was about the latest murmurings surrounding PREM Rugby’s desire to…

THERE ARE plenty of heavy players in rugby but none make the impact of Will Skelton. At 6ft 8in and over 140kg, his size makes him very hard to stop in contact, whether carrying ball, making dominant tackles or clearing rucks. The difference he makes to Australia and La Rochelle is immeasurable as he impacts the whole group around him, giving them belief. I’ve looked at three ways in which my former Saracens team-mate bosses the game… 1 MAUL DOMINANCE Skelton’s technique and weight make him a huge asset in the maul. His ability to be at the front of mauls and blast a way forward is unparalleled. Even when he is targeted, he can take multiple players out of the maul to give his forwards a better chance. We…

CANTERBURY IRELAND RETRO FLEECE €75 elverys.ie Calls to ‘release the fleece’ on TikTok saw this jumper go viral. Canterbury answered the call and it sold out in hours. New stock was set to drop online in early October. SHOSAI DIRTY MATCHA JACKET $344 shosaistore.com Quade Cooper is running a boutique fashion brand out of Tokyo called Shosai. It only sells seven items and they’re all incredibly expensive. None of this shocks us. GAGGIA CLASSIC COFFEE MACHINE £549 gaggiadirect.co.uk Rugby World recently invested in a new coffee machine, opting for the Gaggia Classic. It’s the absolute bee’s knees. EBEN ETZEBETH: UNLOCKED £25 waterstones.com Eat, sleep, smash people at the ruck, repeat. Interested to read the life and times of Eben Etzebeth? Keen to see if there’s more to him than rugby…

IT’S JUST BUSINESS… Steve Diamond is unfortunate to be leaving Newcastle but with Red Bull taking over, the phrase “a new broom sweeps clean” is appropriate. This is a long-term project, not a silver bullet. The money they inject will need to go round more than just the squad. Marketing will be huge in a football city. I watched Glasgow Warriors play Newcastle away in the Challenge Cup. In the city centre, the locals we spoke to on a night out didn’t know their local pro rugby team was playing. Also, their investment will be a drop in the ocean compared to F1. Martin Waugh, Grangemouth, Scotland GET RID OF R360 As more details (if we can call them that) leak out from this new R360 breakaway league fronted by…