VIDEO: Swys' wish as Bok Women build towards World Cup 2025
SPOTLIGHT: With 10 months to go before the World Cup in 2025, Springbok Women performance coach Swys De Bruin has one wish for the game in South Africa.
At the back of a hard-fought 31-24 win over Japan Women in the WXV 2 opener at Cape Town Stadium, De Bruin revealed that the sport will greatly benefit from professionalisation.
The Bulls Daisies are currently the only professional team in South Africa’s Women’s Premier Division.
Last year, the Pretoria-based franchises awarded 35 female players professional contracts and have reaped the rewards ever since.
The Bulls Daisies secured back-to-back Women’s Premier Division titles and 15 players are currently in the Springbok Women’s squad for the WXV 2 campaign.
On Friday in the opener against Japan, seven players from the Pretoria side made up the starting XV, while five were on the bench. Bulls Daisies centre Chumisa Qawe claimed the Player of the Match award.
The other teams like Border Ladies, Sharks Women, Western Province and Boland Dames have yet to follow the route – the teams are currently made up of semi-professional and mostly amateur players.
SA Rugby announced in August that they have been formulating plans to centrally contract as many as 150 female rugby players as early as next year to create an elite Women’s Super League Rugby (WSLR) competition.
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“The Bulls Daisies are the only professional team and they dominated the Women’s Premier Division,” said De Bruin.
“If I can have my wish, we would have all the franchises turn professional. It will be a massive change.
“They [Bulls Daisies] just proven that if you go professional, you train like a professional, you eat like one and you sleep like one.
“You also get money for their work and they are in a happy place.”
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De Bruin added: “If we can keep on playing the sponsors will come and franchises will grow.
“It takes us to a much better situation at this stage.
“A lot of these girls come from situations that are not easy. So I take my hat off to them.
“I think Dave Wessels [General Manager for High Performance Rugby at SA Rugby] is putting a concerted effort to get the Women’s rugby going.”
While there is still work to be done, the women’s game, along with the Test team, has been making massive strides.
The Bok Women booked their place at the 2025 World Cup in England and unlike on previous occasions there is a lot more optimism under the guidance of De Bruin.
“The big aim is the World Cup,” said De Bruin.
“The better we do in the WXV 2, the ranking will improve, so we want good results.
“But we must not get ahead of ourselves and just think it’s runaway victories.
“If we can stick to our processes and fix our mistakes we are on the right track.”
#INTERVIEW: “I want 100 caps and more for the Bok women.” #rugby #sports #news @WomenBoks @WXVRugby https://t.co/F5Ckj6NUWm
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