Another quarter-final exit and another truckload of what-might-have-beens has a wearying familiarity about it, but when the bitter disappointment has abated, overall, Ireland’s World Cup campaign can be viewed positively.
Granted, the bar was low given the failure to qualify for the last World Cup, and as recently as 2023 the first winless Six Nations and wooden spoon since 2004.
The IRFU’s greater investment and the improved support structures around the team under the astute appointment of Scott Bemand and the infusion of the Sevens Olympians has sparked a dramatic upturn. Okay, failing to beat either Japan or Spain and coming up short of the quarter-finals would have been considered a failure, and so, in that sense, what the team achieved in reaching the last eight could be considered par.
But Ireland have cemented their improved ranking of fifth in the world and there was honour in a one-score loss to France, whom Ireland had only beaten three times in 40 previous meetings, as well as a justifiable sense of grievance too.
The 12-match suspension handed out to French flanker Axelle Berthoumieu for biting Aoife Wafer actually seems a tad lenient, but it confirms that it was a full red-card offence. While one cannot recall a red card being brandished during a game for biting, such is the difficulty in categorically proving it on video replays, the evidence looked fairly clear-cut.
It makes you wonder why referee Aimee Barrett-Theron seemed almost dismissive of the Irish complaints in swiftly resuming the game and, not for the first time, what exactly was Ian Tempest doing in his role as TMO.
Had France been reduced to 14 players from the 42nd minute, it might well have been a different outcome, all the more so as lock Manae Feleu was in the sinbin at the time and Les Bleus ultimately conceded three yellow cards.
It ought to have been four, too, as there is also evidence of a blatant hair tug on Aoife Dalton by a French player, which is a yellow-card offence. One can only imagine what the outcry would have been in sections of the French media had Ireland been so ill-disciplined and committed the same offences.
As much as the results, this Irish team has generated a feel-good factor among its widening fan base, who provided the majority of support at both the 30,000 crowd for the pool decider against New Zealand in Brighton and the 11,000 attendance at last Sunday’s quarter-final in Exeter.
This has fuelled hopes that the decision to host Ireland’s final game of the 2026 Six Nations in the Aviva Stadium on Sunday, May 17th will be vindicated by a record-breaking attendance for a stand-alone women’s game in this country of circa 16,000. That would be double the existing record for last season’s Six Nations game against England.
After Sunday’s defeat, Bemand sounded like he saw this as a longer-term project rather than a short-term fix, and the likelihood is that his existing three-year deal to the end of this season will be extended through to the 2029 World Cup in Australia.
The core of this team are young enough to be key figures in the next two World Cup cycles – including the tireless and tough-as-nails Dalton, Dannah O’Brien, Wafer, Ruth Campbell and Erin King – while the likes of Eve Higgins, Brittany Hogan and Neve Jones should be around for the next one.
That said, the structural fault lines underpinning the women’s game remain a longer-term fix. Not unlike men’s rugby in Ireland when the game first turned professional, a short-term solution of sorts may be for more players to move to the PWR in England as Wafer has now done in joining Harlequins.
It’s not ideal as Harlequins, like any club employers, will want their pound of flesh and contrary to popular perception the PWR is not professional per se, with teams required to train in the evenings. There’s no doubt that the Sevens pathway has been hugely beneficial for this Ireland women’s team.
Bemand also needs to give the Irish attack more variety and to stop losing defence coaches like Hugh Hogan, while Alex Codling will be hard to replace now given his full-time move to Munster.
Ireland reaching the semi-finals next weekend for only the second time would have been a landmark achievement, and some of these players will never have that opportunity again. Yet you’d also have to wonder what condition Ireland would have been in if facing England in Bristol next Saturday.
The remarkable Wafer suffered a should injury against France, which would have ruled her out for the rest of the tournament, and most likely Sam Monaghan would have joined fellow co-captain Edel McMahon on the sidelines as well, while Hogan might have well have been ruled out too.
France have underperformed in pretty much every game so far and although they often raise their performance against England, the Red Roses are something of a bogey side for them. Having been thumped at home by England in their sole warm-up game, in current form you’d have to think that a similar outcome awaits the French, all the more so after losing Berthoumieu and co-captain Feleu to suspension.
Maybe the furore regarding the Berthomieu biting will make them circle the wagons, but while this will be a ninth World Cup semi-final, the chances of them reaching a first final look remote.
The first semi-final on Friday night between Canada and New Zealand, ranked second and third in the world respectively, is far harder to call. New Zealand are, of course, the reigning and six-time champions, but they looked a little nonplussed by the unusual pictures which South Africa threw at them, such as that all-in, 15-player lineout.
The Black Ferns are stacked with X-factor as well as pedigree but the big, well-balanced Canadian side look very well coached. They beat Australia comfortably and several good judges believe they can reach the final.
England, now on a run of 30 consecutive wins, remain the warmest of favourites to make up for their dramatic loss in the final four years ago when a sold-out Twickenham hosts the decider in a fortnight’s time and in many ways that would be fitting. As they’ve shown in hosting this tournament, England are the benchmark in women’s rugby.
