Based in Horsham, West Sussex, female personal trainer, Becky, does her best to support professional women’s sport too. Recently, that included a trip to Twickenham for a record-breaking Women’s Six Nations match…
My first trip to see a rugby union match was during the 2025 women’s world cup, when Brighton hosted Ireland versus New Zealand. I’ve never been drawn to rugby, but I have been swept up by the wave of positive role models within the sport during the last few years, partly because USA player, Ilona Maher, caught my attention on social media. I love her approach to training, body image, and promoting her sport in an accessible way – all of these are things I’m supportive of, and so it felt right to help her and others like her by giving the sport my attention.
I had a great time at the match that I went to, and the opportunity to attend another soon presented itself.
Women’s Six Nations 2026
I’ve been exposed to the Men’s Six Nations for most of my life – it’s covered on free to air TV, and I live relatively near to one of the venues in an area that is full of rugby fans… and yet it’s never captured my interest. Even though I worked at matches: I started my post-university career in event day recruitment, with Twickenham being a client I was required to attend in order to sign staff in on one occasion, and on another I was part of the team in hospitality, tasked with ensuring a smooth service via one of the kitchens (I loved the challenge but, where we were positioned obviously meant we saw none of the match and didn’t appreciate the atmosphere either).
I was particularly drawn to go to a Women’s Six Nations match in the wake of the World Cup – the sport built a lot of momentum in the UK as a result of the tournament, and I want women’s sport to become more successful and visible. During the opening weekend of the tournament, England were scheduled to host Ireland at Twickenham, so tickets were booked…
Records broken at Twickenham
As match day approached, media reports of record-breaking ticket sales came out. The 2025 World Cup was a landmark for the women’s game – the final and third-place playoff were played on the same day at Twickenham, the biggest crowd ever for such women’s matches, and an enormous success. The players all looked quite emotional – female sportspeople often still aren’t used to playing to crowds of that size, and they were clearly impressed by the support they’d gained, which is something that a lot of men take for granted.
The match I was due to attend quickly became the most tickets sold for a Women’s Six Nations match, something which was unimaginable two years ago. When the day arrived, we were still a fair distance from the stadium when the impact became obvious – there’s one main public transport route to the ground, and passengers were being funnelled through a connecting station due to the congestion, making it clear this was a big occasion.
Security once we arrived was efficient, but it was even more obvious that there were a lot of people present – the stadium was crowded, we joined one of many long queues for food, and the atmosphere was buzzing.
Once we got to our seats, the stands were very full – not a given at a women’s sport fixture – and we got to witness a celebration of England’s 2025 World Cup win (this was their first international match since), which was lovely.
England vs Ireland at Twickenham
The match went in the manner as we’d predicted: the World Cup-holders outclassed their opponents fairly comfortably, but Ireland put up a good fight and, critically, the crowd was in great spirits. I heard mostly positive comments on the players, with far less sexism than I had prepared myself for. It’s fantastic to see a crowd full of established and new fans – the game is growing, and ticket pricing currently supports that. Compared to the men’s matches, it’s a very cheap day out still, so a brilliant time to try out attending if you’re not sure you’ll enjoy it.
With the crowd being an easy record, something that I thought a lot about was how the women on the pitch will never have been part of such a crowd themselves. They likely grew up attending men’s internationals in order to start dreaming big dreams and, if they attended women’s ones, they were at much smaller venues and a very different affair. However, there’s every chance that, among those in the stands were some young people who will grow up to follow their heroes onto the very same pitch, and that they will namecheck this occasion as where it all began. These things really do matter.