“England came and smashed us at our home last year and we hated that feeling,” says New Zealand lock Maiakawanakaulani Roos, who has travelled to London to hand the Red Roses some payback after they defeated the Black Ferns 33-12 in Auckland to win the inaugural WXV 1 trophy last November.
The defeat had extra sting as the two teams have a long history, especially at Rugby World Cups. They have faced one another in five World Cup finals and New Zealand have won every time, including the last edition. The Red Roses have landed a few punches of their own, including the thumping home defeat which has inspired a revenge mission this Saturday at Twickenham.
“That would be really, really sweet,” Roos says. “Excited, I think that is the biggest way to describe it. I think individually we have been working really hard but as a collective we have been pushing each other.
“ It is just really special the amount of growth we have been able to pull out of each other throughout the year ... We are just here to play, we are here to express ourselves and [build] towards the World Cup [being held in England in 2025].
“All of these games we are going to have, the game at Allianz Stadium [Twickenham] and WXV, are all building blocks. We know we don’t have to be the best right now but I think we have tools in our back pocket to execute when we need it.”
Roos, who became the youngest Black Ferns captain when she led the side against the USA last year, competed in her first Rugby World Cup two years ago and started in the final where the Black Ferns lifted the trophy at a sold-out Eden Park against England. The Red Roses had a chance to win the match with a last-minute lineout but Joanah Ngan-Woo, who replaced Roos in the second half, intercepted and the ball was kicked out.
Roos says of the winning moment: “We had studied the lineouts as locks and our forward pack. When I saw Abbie Ward put her head down, we realised it was going to her. The hand of God [from] Joanah. As soon as she jumped I knew she was going to get it. It was meant to be, it felt like it was a movie. I’m getting goosebumps right now! It was actually crazy. What a special moment.”
Supporters may think moments like that come back to haunt England, especially when facing New Zealand. But for the England back row Alex Matthews, who won the World Cup in 2014 and was involved in the 2017 and 2022 losses, they do not affect her in game week.
“When you’ve done it for long enough, it is what it is,” Matthews says. “It’s a game, you can only do what you do in that moment. I think you are in control of what you’re in control of now, so you have to be in the moment as much as possible and if it’s on the winning side that is even better.
“You don’t want to be worrying either, you want to go into the game confident. Being with these girls, if you don’t feel confident you know you step on that pitch with 14 world-class players and that is what is going to get you through. Having my experience with sevens as well where you get thrashed and then two hours later you have to play again. I have learnt a lot of the switch on, switch off through my sevens career.”
Matthews played and scored a try in the game against the Black Ferns last year. In the week leading up to the match, Matthews was told her father, Dave, had been diagnosed with cancer and since then he has been told it is incurable. The 31-year-old says it was “hard” to process across the other side of the world but she had support from her sister Fran, who works for World Rugby and was also in New Zealand. The Gloucester-Hartpury player says her father has now finished his first round of treatment and is on daily medication but is “doing well”.
“Initially it was really hard and obviously I think every free day I had I was like ‘I want to be at home’,” Matthews says. “But then, my dad always says ‘Life goes on’ and you have also got to continue living your life. This side of the Six Nations I have been trying to get a balance, a bit better balance of doing things I want to do. I think we are doing well, we had a family-filled summer, which was lovely.”
Her father will be in attendance this weekend, cheering on his daughter alongside about 40,000 other supporters. “It’s what we want, we just want to grow the game,” Matthews adds.
“It’s proof we’re doing what we want to do. We want to inspire girls, boys, even older generations. They have come up and said ‘We watched your game against France and now I’ve picked up a rugby ball’. That is amazing, we can influence people’s lives like that, which is crazy.”
