World Cup warm-up: Ireland v Canada, Affidea Stadium, Belfast, Saturday, 12pm
As a child in Co Westmeath, there were certain times of the year when Ivana Kiripati’s dad used to wake her up with a hot chocolate at 4am.
“We would watch the Super Rugby games in New Zealand. Obviously the time difference when their games are on, it’s four in the morning over here. It’s definitely something that me and my dad would bond over.”
Kiripati – a Connacht and former Ireland Under-20s player – got her first senior cap in the opener of two World Cup warm-up games against Scotland last weekend and starts again in the backrow against world number two side Canada in Belfast on Saturday.
She is eager to be involved in Ireland’s campaign where they’ll face the Black Ferns in the last group game and admits getting called up into the training squad was special.
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“I started crying when I got the email. When I got the message from Scott [Bemand, head coach], I was in complete shock. I honestly didn’t even know what to say. I messaged my mom straight away. It was honestly a privilege.”
It would be significant for Kiripati, who was born in New Zealand. Her parents, Kolo and Mele, are Samoan born and New Zealand raised, where they reared their three children until 2006 when her dad got a job with Wanderers RFC.
The family settled in Co Westmeath where Kiripati and her siblings, Kolo Jr and Merisa, played rugby with Buccaneers RFC. “I grew up watching my parents play and then my older brother also played, so it was just the thing where everybody followed one after another.”
Until Kiripati reached under-12s at Buccaneers, there was no girls’ team at that level. She would have had to stop playing or move clubs except that her parents stepped in to coach.
Her parents continued coaching her throughout her teens, right until she broke into the Connacht under-18s team.
“My dad grew up playing it and he knows a lot about it and I trust everything he says about it ... I wouldn’t want to disappoint him in any way. I wanted him to be proud of me after each game that I played.
“But honestly, I never really felt that type of pressure because I loved the sport so much.”
Kiripati was born in 2003, coming of professional rugby age in a time where playing at a high level was something that girls and women could see and strive for.
An under-20s team didn’t exist for many of the older Ireland players, neither did the opportunities to see them in action. But younger players like Kiripati got to see more women’s rugby on TV and she started to wonder if she could follow in their footsteps, including her own “auntie”, former Ireland international Sene Naoupu.
“Sene’s not a blood relative, but she was like an auntie to us growing up, just as many Kiwis and Pacific Islanders in Ireland have been. Our community was very small 10 to 15 years ago, but even then, we treated each other like family, whether or not we were related by blood.
“Ever since I was young, when I first started playing rugby for the women’s side, for the youth side, this is where I’ve always wanted to be. I’ve watched Sene – she was [number] 12 for Ireland. I watched her play growing up as well, and I was like, ‘oh my God, I really want to be there one day. I really want to be there’.”
After secondary school in Our Lady’s Bower in Athlone, Kiripati was due to visit New Zealand to visit relations and friends. However, rugby called, specifically, a scholarship to American International College in Springfield, Massachusetts.
College summers were spent training and playing with Connacht before returning to USA, where even the rugby is different.
“It’s so laid back compared to Ireland. Also, when I was in America, I was playing 13, my last year I was playing 10, which is completely different from what position I play now. So when I come home, I’m always a forward, but when I went to America, I’m training to be a back.”
Kiripati graduated in May 2025, majoring in criminal justice and minoring in psychology. She hadn’t been sure what her next moves were when Bemand called.
“I was in shock because one, I haven’t been home for them to see me play. And two, it’s the World Cup. It only comes around every four years.”
She’ll be 26 years old at the 2029 World Cup in Australia. Whether or not she gets picked this time, she’s focused.
“My ambitions and my goals honestly would probably be just to continue my love for the game, to continue being a better player, focusing on being a better team-mate out on the pitch and just growing my knowledge.
“I guess because [women’s] rugby is growing, it’s probably going to be so different in the next five years. You never know. But yeah, I think at the moment, just being a better sister, daughter and also a team-mate.”
If she does get to play in the group games, and better again, in the New Zealand game, it will be as her whole multicultural self.
“Ireland is my home. Ireland is where my parents chose to raise me and my siblings. I am grateful and I feel blessed to have had the life I have had so far. I am a Samoan girl, born in NZ, doing life in Ireland – how cool is that?”
