{"id":159320,"date":"2025-09-21T18:10:11","date_gmt":"2025-09-21T18:10:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/159320\/"},"modified":"2025-09-21T18:10:11","modified_gmt":"2025-09-21T18:10:11","slug":"meg-jones-turns-missing-last-world-cup-into-superpower-as-england-look-to-final-womens-rugby-world-cup-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/159320\/","title":{"rendered":"Meg Jones turns missing last World Cup into \u2018superpower\u2019 as England look to final | Women’s Rugby World Cup 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"

The England centre Meg Jones has said not playing in the 2022 Rugby World Cup final is her \u201csuperpower\u201d in this year\u2019s tournament, as she prepares for Saturday\u2019s final against Canada. England lost 34-31 to New Zealand<\/a> three years ago, but it was not a game Jones played in as she was not selected for the tournament.<\/p>\n

This final is being held at Twickenham and is set to break the attendance record for a women\u2019s rugby match, with the home of the English game sold out<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Jones said: \u201cI\u2019ve always said my superpower is not being part of that [2022], because it means I don\u2019t carry that on my shoulders, and that gives [me] a different perspective on this tournament.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt doesn\u2019t matter who we are playing, it will be the exact same energy, the exact same emphasis. We just have to remember it\u2019s 80 minutes of rugby, it\u2019s what we love, so let\u2019s go out there and give it everything. We\u2019ve got one last chance to change the game in England.\u201d<\/p>\n

France put England\u2019s defence under huge pressure in Saturday\u2019s semi-final in Bristol<\/a> but Jones was impressed by the shifts they put in. It was not a perfect performance, though, and the 28-year-old said there is room for improvement.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think just a few soft errors,\u201d she said. \u201cWe gave them the ball quite a bit so we put them back into the game. If we can retain the ball, which we know we can, we can take a lot of confidence from our defensive sets as well because I think defence is going to win us championships.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ellie Kildunne scoree England\u2019s first try during their 35-17 win against France. Photograph: Tom Jenkins\/The Guardian<\/p>\n

Jones, who scored the try that sealed the win, said the semi-final pressure was exactly what the team needed. \u201cEveryone will have comments on how we play and what the game looks like. But let me tell you, that defensive shift sums us up.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWe\u2019ve got so much heart and desire in this team. We\u2019re enjoying what we\u2019re doing. We\u2019re having fun out there, there are some good celebrations going on. We\u2019re trying to enjoy the game as much as we can. The pressure is already big, we don\u2019t need to make it bigger, so let\u2019s just enjoy it for what it is.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The England centre Meg Jones has said not playing in the 2022 Rugby World Cup final is her…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":159321,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85],"class_list":["post-159320","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-rugby","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/159320","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=159320"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/159320\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/159321"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=159320"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=159320"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=159320"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}