{"id":158725,"date":"2025-09-21T11:52:08","date_gmt":"2025-09-21T11:52:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/158725\/"},"modified":"2025-09-21T11:52:08","modified_gmt":"2025-09-21T11:52:08","slug":"england-focus-on-one-more-massive-job","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/158725\/","title":{"rendered":"England focus on ‘one more massive job’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hannah Botterman, the loosehead prop whose barnstorming performance played such a big role in ensuring England will play in their home Rugby World Cup Final next Saturday, was unequivocal when asked if the team would find time to toast their 35-17 semi-final win<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“No, no celebration, we’ve not won anything,” said Botterman, outlining in one simple sentence the message that will clearly dominate the Red Roses camp during final week.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“We knew we had to get this job done first and we still have one more massive job to do,” she added.\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘We had a good chat’<\/p>\n

Three Botterman turnovers in the first 40 minutes was a critical component in England managing to somehow sneak into the break 7-5 ahead, despite having been dominated by France. The turnaround thereafter was significant.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“We made it hard for ourselves but rugby is all about those pressure moments and who can perform best,” replacement second-row Rosie Galligan said. “In the first half we had a few mistakes where we put pressure on ourselves but at half-time we had a good chat about being more direct and playing to our strengths. Getting people on the ball who can carry and kick and playing down in France’s red zone.”<\/p>\n

Perhaps the biggest plus England fans – and indeed head coach John Mitchell – will take from the bruising semi-final is that the players rose up when the pressure was at its greatest.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“We love the battle,” Galligan said. “We love playing against France. They tested us today. That’s what we want. We know we’ve got things to work on next week. We’re in a World Cup final and that is the best feeling in the world.”<\/p>\n

‘It’s amazing’<\/p>\n

Embracing all that comes with that “best feeling in the world” is clearly a key part of this team’s attitude towards the once-in-a-generation opportunity in front of them.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“To know you\u2019re supported and it\u2019s accepted, encouraged and celebrated on the international stage, it\u2019s amazing,” second-row forward and mother, Abbie Ward said. “It\u2019s not just about inspiring young girls and boys, it\u2019s also inspiring mothers and other people that they can do this too.<\/p>\n

“It\u2019s amazing when you get a message saying, ‘Oh, I stopped playing when I started my family but actually seeing you do it has helped me to start exercising again or pick up the ball and reconnect with old teammates again’. Anything we can do to help inspire that is quite special.”<\/p>\n

‘We’re super confident’<\/p>\n

Now the chance is there to take it all to the next level against Canada in front of 82,000-plus inside Allianz Stadium and millions more around the world. A chance this team does not intend to pass up.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“We’ve earned the right for another week and we’ll go again,” star centre Megan Jones said. “Yes, attack we can brush up on a few things but we’re super confident going into next week.”<\/p>\n

That confidence appears to be flowing throughout the team; captain Zoe Aldcroft “cannot wait to get out there”, while star full-back Ellie Kildunne is “absolutely buzzing” and head coach Mitchell simply underlines the opportunity, not the pressure.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“Two really good sides in the final, number one in the world and number two and they both deserve to be there,” Mitchell said.<\/p>\n

“It’s awesome for the game.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Hannah Botterman, the loosehead prop whose barnstorming performance played such a big role in ensuring England will play…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":158726,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85,83],"class_list":["post-158725","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-rugby","tag-sports","tag-text"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158725","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=158725"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158725\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/158726"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=158725"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=158725"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=158725"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}