\u201cAt this time of year, the pitch is either totally swamped or they\u2019re hard,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
As patron of the Rugby Football Union, the princess hosted a reception to celebrate the national team\u2019s achievement in September last year \u2013 its first World Cup victory since 2014.<\/p>\n
Britain’s Catherine, Princess of Wales, poses with members of England Women’s Rugby team during a reception following their World Cup win in 2025, at Windsor Castle. Photo \/ Kin Cheung, Pool, AFP<\/p>\n
The players were welcomed to Windsor Castle\u2019s Green Drawing Room by the Band of the Irish Guards, of which the Princess is Colonel, and all wore their winning medals.<\/p>\n
The royal asked anyone whether they had a \u201csore head\u201d after the team marked their win at a ball in London\u2019s Grosvenor Hotel the night before.<\/p>\n
She also congratulated them, saying: \u201cReally well done. I hope you were able to celebrate last night and to really reminisce on an incredible achievement.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019ve really inspired all the new generation [that] perhaps might not even have thought rugby was for them. I think it really showed how accessible rugby is to so many types of girls in different parts of the country.\u201d<\/p>\n
At the end of the reception, she was handed a bag of gifts from the captain, which included a signed England rugby shirt as well as a medal.<\/p>\n
Speaking after the princess had left, player Ellie Kildunne said Catherine had been a \u201cgood sport\u201d when wearing a cowboy hat at one of the team\u2019s matches.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe did a bit of a cowboy dance, and it was a really special moment,\u201d Kildunne said. \u201cShe\u2019s now officially a cowboy, so I will have to tattoo her as well.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cObviously, as they get physically stronger \u2013 George now, if we play at home, I do not want…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":235505,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[5195,3013,3595,39200,2511,14032,307,139301,156,12856,111,139,69,1118,10538,35478,4940,28821,12860,6327,139300,1361,61,1491,4524,102,33057],"class_list":["post-235504","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-be","tag-but","tag-by","tag-charlotte","tag-child","tag-daughter","tag-dont","tag-eldest","tag-entertainment","tag-george","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-of","tag-play","tag-plays","tag-prince","tag-princess","tag-revealed","tag-rugby","tag-tackled","tag-that","tag-to","tag-wales","tag-want","tag-with","tag-wouldnt"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235504","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=235504"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235504\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/235505"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=235504"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=235504"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=235504"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}