"It's unreal": Women's Final to close the show at Perth SVNS

IN THE SPOTLIGHT: For the first time in history, the Women’s Grand Final is set to close out the event at the Perth SVNS from January 24-26.

The SVNS World Series has traditionally operated with the Men’s Final going on last, with the WA event bucking the trend to the delight of injured star Madison Ashby

“It’s unreal. it’ll be hectic to get prime time for the girls so hopefully I’ll be there and I’ll be watching but if not, I’ll be cheering them on from home,” Ashby said to Rugby.com.au.

Tim Walsh’s side have been drawn with France in Pool C, the team that denied them the bronze medal at the Cape Town event in December, alongside Spain and China as they look to take out their first home event since 2018.

“We respect every opposition. There’s a pretty tasty crossover there with either New Zealand or USA but obviously first job’s first, we’ve got to get through the pool and ideally, we top that,” coach Walsh said.

“We’ll be focusing our energy on those three teams and then looking forward to day two.

“I think it was obviously heartbreaking [not winning last year] and not playing to our potential was probably the thing that really hurts us.

“We’re not an outcome-based team and we know if we perform to our best that we should be walking away with the right colour medals.

“It was a fantastic tournament and we’re really looking forward to getting on that plane, landing in Perth and prepping and putting on a show and really expressing ourselves in the gold jersey.

Series leaders New Zealand have been drawn in Pool A with defending Perth champions Ireland, Japan and Brazil whilst USA, Canada, Great Britain and Fiji make up Pool B.

Pool A

New Zealand, Japan, Ireland, Brazil

Pool B

Canada, USA, Great Britain, Fiji

Pool C

Australia, France, China, Spain

Source: Rugbycomau