Lioness star Mead is encouraged by Dow, who broke her leg but fought back to be at the forefront of the Red Roses’ Grand Slam success.

England winger Dow has words of comfort for the Lioness’s star forward Beth Mead; ‘Has Beth broken her leg?  Well not quite.’  Mead has very severe cruciate ligament injury.

‘I tell her you are always going to get setbacks. You just need to take every step as it comes on your way to a comeback.

‘Beth has to remember there will be many big games to come in her career.

‘She has to enjoy the painful process of making it back to the top.’

Dow, 26, had her leg broken against Wales in the 2022 6 Nations. Yet she defied the odds to make it to the world Cup. However, Dow adds a word of caution about England’s ability to set further record crowds at Twickenham. She has just scored the sensational try which kick-started England ‘s championship winning performance against France and said. ‘None of us have witnessed that crowd before. It was an absolute privilege to go out there and score on home turf. But we have to realise we can’t expect to attract records crowds for games in future that are not ‘the crunch’ with the title at stake’.

Meanwhile women, alongside playing in front of a world record crowd, now have a first ever oil painting in the President’s Lounge at the HQ of rugby.

Retired England captain Sarah Hunter: “When RFU first mentioned this, I thought it was such an amazing idea to represent the women’s game and the history behind it. It shows how integral the women’s game is to rugby now, with this amazing piece of artwork taking pride of place. In another 100 years, it will have stood the test of time.”