It's no exaggeration to suggest that 2025 has the potential to be the biggest ever for women’s rugby.
All World Cup years carry extra weight, but given that this year’s tournament is in England, the significance is even greater.
The Red Roses’ dominance in the Six Nations isn't ideal from a competitive point of view, but it’s turned England into the biggest market in the world for the women’s game.
In 2023, just under 60,000 supporters – a record for a women’s rugby game – watched England beat France in a Grand Slam decider at Twickenham. Last year, nearly 50,000 were there for their 88-10 hammering of Ireland. Next month, the 60,000 mark is likely to be broken when England host the French on the final day of the championship.
The World Cup in August is already breaking records. In December of 2024 ticket sales had already broken the previous record of 220,000, and that’s only going to grow higher in the next five months before it all kicks off.
The stadiums will be bigger, the audience – both in person and on TV – will be greater, and the stakes will be even higher.
If there was ever a year to make a mark on the pitch, this is it.
"I think women's rugby is sort of having its moment and I hope that continues," Ireland scrum-half Emily Lane said this week.
"We all love the game and we just want as many people to see us play, and to know that women's rugby is really exciting and it is really tough. And it's not all about the men. I mean, they're great and all, but the women are great too."
On a more global scale, the impact of Ilona Maher (above) is also spreading the game.
The USA Sevens star became the biggest name in rugby during the Paris Summer Olympics thanks to her social media influence. For context, her 4.9 million followers on Instagram are more than four times that of Antoine Dupont, the biggest name in the men’s game.
So influential is Maher’s impact in the sport, when it was confirmed she would be joining Bristol Bears on a short-term deal at the end of 2024, her debut game against Gloucester-Hartpury was instantly moved from Shaftesbury Park to Ashton Gate due to "unprecedented demand" in tickets, and the 9,240 attendance set a new record for a standalone game in Premiership Women’s Rugby (PWR).
"I think it's really, really exciting and Maher, she's some character. We'd know her from the Sevens circuit and she was the same there, too," Lane, who was part of Ireland’s Olympic Sevens squad, added.
"It's great to have her personality trying to bring people in and we saw what it did for the PWR. Her presence got people coming to games. They've got stadiums changed just because she was playing. Hopefully that will start happening for us too.
"Performances will bring supporters and bring people along our 'Green Wave’, and that's what we're really focusing on, is our performance on the pitch. We want as many people to get on board our Green Wave and come out and support us."
Lane (below) will earn her eleventh Ireland cap in this afternoon’s Guinness Women’s Six Nations opener against France in Belfast, in what will be her first championship appearance since 2021.
Having been part of the Sevens system since 2018, the Cork scrum-half made her debut for the Ireland XVs team in the 2021 Six Nations while the World Sevens series was on hold due to Covid-19.
After becoming an Olympian last summer, Lane returned to the longer form of the game for the WXV in Canada, and while she featured in all three games of that campaign, as well as the warm-up against Australia in Belfast, the 26-year-old believes she’s ready to kick on further.
"Definitely in the WXV campaign back in September, I was a bit nervous getting in but since moving into the fully centralised program after Christmas, I feel like I've really settled into it.
"This squad, we've been together now for a couple of weeks, and I think we've got really good connections. And for me personally, I think it's been great, and I've really, really enjoyed it. I've enjoyed being back in.
"I've been in a high-performance program since I was 19-years-old and I think that brings a lot to how I approach games and trainings and coming in here every day.
"I think the professionalism that you get from that is something that can't be matched. And then in Sevens, it's a very brutal game. It's very physically tough."
Given the rise this Ireland team had in 2024, it will be hard to sustain that level of growth in the year ahead.
But Lane remains bullish about what this Ireland team can achieve, starting in Belfast today.
"We have built a lot in the past couple of seasons and we're not going out in this game just to play the game.
"We are looking to perform and try to win this game. We've been training together and the training's been very, very tough.
"France are a really tough side and there's no denying that, but I think Ireland are a tough side too. And we really want to give them a good rattle."
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