Lichfield Ladies will again be impressively represented in the final games of the Women’s 6 Nations this weekend. England will field four of the team while Scotland will have three amongst their replacements. [There could have been five in the England team but scrum half Natasha (Mo) Hunt is sidelined by injury.]
Harriet Millar-Mills (Photo: Inpho)
Last time out hooker Amy Cokayne scored a hat-trick against Scotland, a feat that was slightly over-shadowed by team-mate Kay Wilson’s seven tries. Supremely talented centre Emily Scarratt will be looking to dust off her kicking boots after an uncharacteristically bad day at the office against Scotland, however her overall game, distribution of the ball not to mention her try would always make her one of the first names on the team sheet – for me anyway.
With prop Justine Lucas and Harriet Millar-Mills as Lock linking up with Cokayne in the scrum the team-mates help to make England’s scrum and rolling maul an incredible weapon and a sight to behold.
Together these four boast 149 caps and one can see many more in their future. England women’s final game against Ireland in this 6 Nations is a ‘winner takes all situation’ with the Grand Slam up for grabs for both teams.
England’s Lichfield Women
13 Emily Scarratt ( 65 caps)
2 Amy Cokayne (24 caps)
3 Justine Lucas (18 caps)
5 Harriet Millar-Mills (42 caps)
Meanwhile Scotland women will be hoping to finish their campaign on a high when they take on Italy at 6.30 tonight at Cumbernauld. Scotland were so close to victory against Ireland and suffered heavy losses to both France and England but their win against Wales shows some reward for their hard work.
On the bench for Scotland are three Lichfield Ladies:
16 Rachel Malcolm (3 caps)
19 Sarah Bonar (6 caps)
21 Jenny Maxwell (14 caps)
Lichfield will also be represented by lock Molly Morrissey when the England U20s women take on France at the Stade Guy Boniface tomorrow evening.
This is the third of three matches for the U20s:
England 38 – 15 Army Women
Thursday 16 February, Aldershot Army Rugby Stadium
England 7 – 17 France
Saturday 25 February, Esher RFC
France v England: Friday 17 March, KO 7pm, Stade Guy Boniface, Mont-de-Marsan
Holly Aitchison (Photo: England Rugby)
Whilst not in action this weekend Lichfield also have three players involved in the Women’s 7s Series: Holly Aitchison, Milly Wood and Lucy Nye. The Series this time round has six venues for the women’s tour and these players will hope to be involved when they moved to round four when for the first time the HSBC World Rugby Women’s Sevens Series takes place in Japan, the HSBC Kitakyushu Sevens on 22-23 April.
Of course there is now a downside to all this success because Lichfield Ladies have been overlooked by the RFU for a place in the new Super Rugby League, despite the possibility of winning the Premiership and producing this succession of awesome internationals, all these players will be forced to leave the club and join a team in the new league, this is a change that will be enforced, they say, by the RFU – can’t help wonder if England would really overlook players like Amy Cokayne and Emily Scarratt .
So whilst Lichfield are on the brink of celebrating great success they are also on the brink of relegation – one can only hope that someone sees sense.
More than 5,000 people have signed a petition to the RFU, asking them to reconsider their decision, if you would like to add your name, you can find it here:
https://www.change.org/p/rfu-rfu-to-review-lichfield-ladies-bid
