{"id":248866,"date":"2025-10-29T14:57:12","date_gmt":"2025-10-29T14:57:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/248866\/"},"modified":"2025-10-29T14:57:12","modified_gmt":"2025-10-29T14:57:12","slug":"the-pwr-team-growing-their-own-red-roses","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/248866\/","title":{"rendered":"The PWR team growing their own Red Roses"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Trailfinders<\/a> may have started the Premiership Women\u2019s Rugby<\/a> season with a loss to Exeter Chiefs<\/a> but they are a team their opponents and fans should keep an eye on this campaign.<\/p>\n

The club are in their third season in the women\u2019s top-flight where they have already produced sixth and seventh place finishes but they have signed a whole host of stars who will be aiming to nudge them up the table.<\/p>\n

The signings have included England\u2019s Meg Jones, Scotland\u2019s Francesca McGhie<\/a> and New Zealand\u2019s Alana Borland. Silverware is of course the goal but the squad has also changed significantly with head coach Barney Maddison putting his stamp on the team. Maddison took over from Giselle Mather just after pre-season last campaign.<\/p>\n

Trailfinders Director of Rugby Ben Ward said of their business between seasons: \u201cI think if you look at the PWR<\/a> over the last few years, if we are being honest the teams that have done well are probably the ones with the most Red Roses.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Trailfinders Women <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Exeter Chiefs Women <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\u201cWe currently still only have two Red Roses in our squad as a whole. I think there are multiple reasons for that, we are going through a process of trying to grow our own Red Roses through our academy and through Brunel University who are in BUCS super rugby. That\u2019s a longer term plan and we are starting to see some fruition to that.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you talk about the signings, I think we also lost a lot this year as well. I think probably Barney would say it was the first year where it\u2019s his squad. I think you saw that turnover but we are really excited.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere has been a mixture of what he wanted with some experience with people like Rachel Malcolm<\/a>, certain specific positions we went after for example at hooker where you know the lineout is so important \u2013 we\u2019re really excited about Niamh Swailes<\/a>, but you have Georgia Ponsonby<\/a> in there as well as our existing players like Cristina Blanco.\u201d<\/p>\n

Growing their own Red Roses is something that comes up multiple times during the interview and it\u2019s something the club want to achieve through their academy and pathway with Brunel University. Ward adds the working relationship Trailfinders have with the university is \u201chuge, absolutely massive\u201d to the long-term success of the PWR<\/a> team.<\/p>\n

\u201c[Many PWR clubs have that link] Harlequins<\/a> are probably going that way with Surrey at the moment and I think you will see Sale going that way from what I have seen and heard from their investment,\u201d Ward said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s good for many reasons. One it\u2019s giving girls a good training ground where they are able to express themselves amongst their peers, age grade wise which helps them with their confidence. So when they step up into the PWR if you are a young nine or ten you are used to bossing people around but it\u2019s harder to boss people around who are a little bit older and have been doing it a long time.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think you are introducing them to things like the strength and conditioning training that is a step up from what would have been done at school and it\u2019s moving towards university, more of that full-time environment albeit with your studies as well.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s so important for the girls to get game time and below the PWR there is maybe a bit of a gap at the moment in English rugby, you don\u2019t get second team games or anything like that so it is a nice bridge for them to play really competitive rugby against those age grade peers.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt also teaches them they have to manage their social life, a work life and also have to be a part of the PWR and whatever they are doing off the field which sets them up nicely for the future. Rather than going in to a full-time rugby environment and not diversifying themselves because it can be a very short career.\u201d<\/p>\n

Trailfinders are in a unique position as they are the only PWR team who do not also have a men\u2019s team in the Premiership. It\u2019s something Ward says puts them in an \u201cinteresting\u201d position.<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cWe have got used to that over the years that we can only control what we can control. I really do think for us the showcase of our club is our PWR team because they go out there at the highest level the women\u2019s game can play, it\u2019s the premiership and for us that is really unique.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe love the fact we have a team in the women\u2019s Premiership, I think we are in an interesting position because a lot of the conversations that happen at the top revolve around the men and women\u2019s team and you\u2019ll see the PWR and PRL are aligning a lot closer now. We have one foot in the door with that but not the other foot.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll we can do is enjoy it, on the back of a World Cup, I think it\u2019s an amazing stage for these girls to go out and play rugby.\u201d<\/p>\n

The team will once again take to that stage on Saturday 8th November against Sale Sharks<\/a> as the team have a bye-week in round two.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Trailfinders may have started the Premiership Women\u2019s Rugby season with a loss to Exeter Chiefs but they are…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":248867,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-248866","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-rugby","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-rugby","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248866","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=248866"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248866\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/248867"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=248866"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=248866"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=248866"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}