LESS than a month from the opening of the 2025 Rugby World Cup, Fiji and Samoa will represent the Pacific in the grandest occasion of international women’s rugby.
From August 22 to September 27, rugby eyes will be on the World Cup hosted by England.
Fiji recently won the Oceania Women’s Rugby Championship and played two tough test matches against quality sides – Australia in May, and the USA two weeks ago.
Perhaps the biggest change in Fijiana landscape was the appointment of Ioan Cunningham who became the new head coach in February.
In an exclusive interview, Cunningham shared what it’s been like in the Fijiana camp.
“Our preparations are going so well. We are making progress. We are training well as a team,’’ he said.
“We are growing a great team connection and relationship. We are still growing the clarity of our game and how we want to play. I think we are making strides, and the green shoots are coming through from what we’ve put in place.
“We’ve still got some players back home in Fiji that didn’t travel with us to the USA. And I was clear with the playing group, post Oceania, that I would want to look at a few more players. I’ve had the opportunity to do that. The few players back home were given a program to follow while we’ve been up here. When we arrive back in Fiji, we will have a selection meeting and pull everything together and settle on our final 32.”
Cunningham firmly believes that Fijian women can be the best rugby players in the world and hopes to harness their potential to achieve more from the game.
“We can be a massive force in World Rugby. But firstly, there’s a couple of things we’ve got to get right,’’ he said.
“We need to get that clarity in how we want to play. We need to get excited with the opportunity that we’ve got to show the world what we can do and our talent on the field. The most important thing is that we really focus on how we need to perform, the structures and the areas in the game we want to target.’’
Cunningham referred to the approach as: “Winning the next minute and staying focused.”
The Fijiana approach revolves around free-flowing flamboyant rugby, and they thrive in open play.
However, based on past matches such as the clash against USA, it is often decisions by the referee or match officials which will cost them the game.
In the Fijiana-USA match there were issues with officials not calling out offside opposition players, play continuing despite a clear knock-on, and not clarifying with the Television Match Officials if the ball was held up over the try line.
The Fijiana head coach recognises these flaws and has plans to deal with the issues.
“What I do is, I will meet with the referee 48 hours before the test match. Whether that’s in person over a coffee or online on Zoom. I will speak honestly to her about the key areas of the game that we are looking to do in our performance,’’ Cunningham said.
“I would like to know how she is going to referee the game and ask if there are any categories she will be focusing on, so I can tell our team why she does that. I will make sure she knows the right players to speak to and grow that relationship.
“Alongside that, in post-matches, we can send clips to referees and their managers on what we see, and ask questions like, do you think you got it right here? and what could you have done differently? This is done so that we improve every match.”
Focusing on the RWC, Cunningham hints that a quarter-final berth is possible.
“That is our ambition and our goal, 100 per cent,’’ he said.
“But what we have to get right is to be focused on each game as they come. Our first challenge is Canada then we’ll reassess after that. Our second challenge is Scotland and our third is against Wales. It’s a game-by-game mentality and if we get those bits right, the rest might take care of itself. We are open and honest with each other. We’ve got a great opportunity here to do something special and that’s what we’ve got to aim for as a team.”
Since taking on the head coach job in Fiji, Cunningham recognized how far the sport had grown but highlighted areas improvement. These include more alignment throughout high performance units trickling down to school or community level rugby.
He said there was a need for clear programmes to produce the next crop of Fijiana Players.
“We need to know what the game is demanding of the players now and what the game will demand of the players in two years’ time,’’ Cunningham said.
“The laws of the game changes, everyone will be faster, and it will be a more open game. Therefore, the demands for these players will change.
“But what’s fantastic about our players is that they can play rugby with the best players in the world but it’s about growing their knowledge of when to do that and how to create opportunities to do that.
“It’s about representing Fiji and inspiring the next group of young players, I think that is a powerful message,” he said.