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Worthing Women make history with all-homegrown starting team
Worthing’s women’s team recently achieved a remarkable milestone: fielding a starting XV composed entirely of players who had played junior girls’ rugby at the club.
This came during a thrilling Wednesday night floodlit match against Navy’s Senior Women’s XV, which ended in a 26-all draw in front of a 500-strong crowd.
The Worthing team was a young side, separate from their league squad, and featured both current and former players. They were put together to play a series of invitational games to aid player retention from juniors to senior rugby.
Chris Gaskell, Head of Women and Girls’ Rugby, said: “Before the game, I was sorting team out and realised the entire starting team as well as three of the replacements had all played junior rugby at the club.
“I brought it to our Chair and President, and we thought, ‘Has this even been done before?’ Well, at the club, certainly not! Our Chair has a very good rugby brain and knows his stuff, reached out to a few people and of teams who’ve always had strong girls’ sections, but we couldn’t find any other club who had done it before.”
The club’s senior women’s side has benefitted from the midweek team. They were bottom of their league at the beginning of the year, but, thanks to the influx of former players, they’ve won their last three league fixtures and now sit fifth in Women's NC 2 South East (South).
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A strong player pathway
Worthing has built a healthy, strong girls’ section that has gone from strength to strength over the past six years. Many players have gone on to play high-level rugby, including for Premiership and Championship clubs, and in the BUCS super rugby programme, including Harlequins and England U20 flanker Lucy Heryet.
Gaskell added: “Many of our former players from our girls’ section go on to play rugby elsewhere, whether it be at a higher level or that they move away. But I always make sure I tell the girls that there’s always a place for them at this club. It will always be their home; it’s where they started and they’re always welcome back.
“We are trying to get a lot more female coaches involved in our girls’ section. We have just brought on Sophie Stafford as a new coach for U18 for next season, and she is a former captain of U18 girls.
“Our U18s team are role models for many of our younger female players. They’re back-to-back Sussex champions and are fighting at the top of the Surrey league this season too. The team gives our players a really good platform and it’s a team our younger players aspire to be a part of.
“We’ve started to highlight on our team sheets when a player has played junior or girls’ rugby at our club to show players that there is a pathway for them to keep playing.”
The club has big plans for the remainder of the season, including a doubleheader with their men’s first team, who played in National League 2 East, on the 12 April as well as their girls’ team competing in their club’s Girls 10s festival, welcoming teams from across the country for an action-packed weekend of rugby.
With a thriving pathway and an ever-strengthening senior squad, Worthing’s women’s rugby looks set to continue breaking new ground for years to come.
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