Wall believes there has been an “improvement” despite the results
Team captain Nichola Fryday has admitted last week’s article in The Telegraph detailing alleged sexism within the IRFU didn’t make for nice reading for the Ireland women’s rugby squad.
Writing in the national UK newspaper, Fiona Tomas reported on a number of revelations that paint an unflattering picture of the union in relation to how they operate the women’s game in Ireland.
While she didn’t necessarily see it as a distraction, the fact that it was published on Thursday – just hours before head coach Greg McWilliams unveiled his match day 23 for a Women’s Six Nations Championship clash against Italy in Parma two days later – wasn’t ideal for Fryday and her international colleagues.
“I wouldn’t say it was a distraction, but it definitely didn’t feel nice for us as players to read on a Thursday morning. It was squad announcement day, they’re exciting days for girls. You’re going to represent your country and building ourselves up for a Captain’s Run on Friday. To wake up and read that, it wasn’t how you’d want your prep to go for a week, to be honest,” Fryday explained.
“For me, a lot of the stuff we’ve had a look over the last few weeks, if girls want to read it they can read it, but you have to be able to park it and focus on the job at hand. There’s some girls who are making the choice to come off social media because it’s too much of a strain, but it’s something you just have to park.”
Sitting beside Fryday at a press conference held in the IRFU’s High Performance Centre earlier today, Tipperary native Dorothy Wall acknowledged it has been tough to deal with three straight losses to date in this year’s Championship, but insisted the bond within the group remains strong.
“There’s outside noise and obviously the results haven’t gone our way and I think anyone would be very naive to think we don’t take ownership of that. We’re the ones on the pitch, we have to look that in the face the day after.
“Review it, look after ourselves. Look after each other and get on with the job. It’s tough, but in terms of the camaraderie, it’s the most important part, that we get around each other and rally again.”
This coming Saturday will see Ireland returning to Musgrave Park in Cork for their second and final home game of the 2023 Six Nations. It was just over 10 years ago that the Irish defeated their upcoming opponents England for the very first time in a competitive women’s fixture, but the two sides are in very different positions a decade later.
Whereas the English currently sit on top of the Championship table with a maximum tally of 15 points, Ireland are still looking to get a point on board and are currently only ahead of basement side Scotland on score difference.
Trying to curtail Simon Middleton’s outfit is about as daunting a task as you can imagine in the international game, but Wall is not looking upon their forthcoming showdown with a pessimistic outlook.
“We always focus on ourselves, so it’s what we do best and can improve on. There has been an improvement, we can recognise it in ourselves over the last three games in certain aspects, albeit the results weren’t where we want them to be.
“It [a successful day] would be an improvement in what we have set out, how we want our set-piece to function. How we want our attack in the 22 to go. All personal goals we have set out. That’s very clear in our squad,” Wall added.