Claire Molloy, former Ireland captain and current Bristol back-row, chats exclusively to Sky Sports about women's rugby struggles, her life as an A&E doctor and rugby player, and where Irish rugby has gone wrong...
With every season that passes fresh attendances are being set in the women's game. From November 2022 when an epic World Cup final between New Zealand's Black Ferns and England's Red Roses saw a world record 42,579 pack out Eden Park, to the near 60,000 fans who watched the 2023 Six Nations Grand Slam finale between the Red Roses and France at Twickenham, to almost 10,000 supporters at the Premier 15s (now named Premiership Women's Rugby) final earlier this year.
Yet, just last week, Ireland and Saracens back-row Grace Moore - who played in each round of the Six Nations earlier this year, and came off the bench for Saracens in their Premier 15s semi-final in June - was forced to take to social media to ask for help with a sponsor for rugby boots ahead of the forthcoming season.
It's a disconnect in clear terms, but by no means unusual.
Bristol back-row Molloy represented Ireland in 74 Tests between 2009 and September 2021, retiring as captain. Throughout the entirety of her rugby career, the 35-year-old has balanced life with another job: an A&E doctor.
Speaking to Sky Sports on the phone from her car outside Bristol Bears' HPC, having just come off an emergency shift at Morriston Hospital in Swansea and preparing to head for another night's training, when Molley began her playing career as a budding medicine student in Cardiff, there was no such thing as a women's rugby player who did not work elsewhere.
Times are changing for the better in the sport, but as Molloy points out, women's rugby is teetering in an uncomfortable position as it tiptoes its way into professionalism.
"There definitely could have been more investment and support in Irish rugby. But looking at the nature of the game, would it have been nice to have my boots paid for? Yeah. But would I have preferred investment and better skills coaches? Probably. That's probably because luckily enough I've had an income to supply my boots.
"Looking at Grace's [Moore] situation, I've seen Jade Konkel, Scotland international, make the same plea on Twitter. It's not unique to the Irish girls. These contracts we're looking at now in a professional light, there's still a cost of living crisis.
"They are not getting massive salaries. £400 a year for boots, that could be a finance that stops them buying the groceries they want and the food they need.
"They are not making a living being a professional athlete. They are just about scraping by in the women's game. There may be full-time contracts for internationals, but you've got to rent somewhere in Dublin. How quickly is that going to gobble up your salary?
"What we'll probably see in years to come is that this model of rugby has to be very careful not to price out people from lower income backgrounds, and that whole talent pool being excluded. Because financially, families can't support these players to develop to become athletes the way the more affluent can.
"That's something I discuss with friends across club levels. As we step into a semi-professional/professional era, at the moment the girls that can commit either need a job that can allow them to, or need the financial support that means they don't have to work the hours to make the time.
"You're looking at 15/16 hours a week just training and adding in a matchday on the same time. It could be a 25/30 hour week. If you add in travel, the prep around training, the feeding. It's the equivalent of more than a part-time job, and yes there are contracted players, but there are still a good chunk across the Premiership that aren't getting paid and doing it for the love of rugby. And they are the ones that can afford to do it.
"I hope rugby doesn't leave behind all those types of players. In increasing diversity in the game, we want everyone to see someone like themselves on the pitch, and that's really important going forward."
'Legacy left with Ireland is heartbreaking; We missed boat and are years behind English development pathways'
A Galway native, if Molloy was always going to be a doctor - having been fascinated with medicine and science "from day dot" - she was seemingly destined too to have some involvement in sport.
Remarkably, each of her three siblings represented Ireland at different sports in underage levels and while Gaelic football was Molloy's first love, it was only moving to Cardiff in 2007 to study medicine that her talents were opened up to the world of rugby union.
"I came over to Cardiff and there was no Gaelic football to be played. I had an interest in rugby and thought, this looks like a sport for me. Being in Wales, it seemed like a natural fit.
"I did fancy myself as a nippy back when I first joined, but they quickly put me in the forwards. They knew I liked being busy, so back-row has stuck since then!"
Despite balancing a pressured career as an A&E doctor, Molloy was instrumental in Ireland's most successful period which included winning a Six Nations Grand Slam in 2013 (which she repeated in 2015) and captaining the side to qualify for the Sevens World Cup later that year, while at the 2014 Women's Rugby World Cup, she was part of the Ireland side which knocked out New Zealand to make the semi-finals.
The low point of her career arrived prior to international retirement in September 2021 when a World Cup qualifying tournament in Parma brought shock defeats to Spain and Scotland, which saw Italy qualify for the World Cup at Ireland's expense.
After missing out on that World Cup, Ireland have since gone on to experience the worst period in their history, culminating in a 2023 Six Nations Wooden Spoon after five defeats, the result of which saw them placed in the third tier of the new WXV tournament during October, playing the likes of Kazakhstan, Colombia and Spain - beating the latter only due to a try with five minutes to play.
How have Ireland gone from Six Nations champions to their current state in just eight years?
"There's been lots of analysis, conversations, reviews and articles written about Irish women's rugby. You have to look at where has the Irish club game progressed? Where are we producing players? Keeping hold of them? We've missed the boat.
"There were opportunities at the height of 2014, 2015, 2016, where that was the time to look at the structure of the game in terms of clubs, develop better quality competition, look at the Interpros and give continuity to players and coaches with a regular schedule.
"I don't know how many times the season structure has changed year-on-year. How do you plan for that? How do you maintain and retain players when they don't know when the Interpros will be this year? And that's been the same for many years."
Molloy feels other nations such as the English Premiership is "10-15 years ahead of development pathways in Ireland and that they need to create a competitive league to retain players.
"It's not going to be written in a day. If you look at the investment and development in the Irish Women's Sevens programme, how many years has it taken them to get Olympic qualification? That's how long it takes, with continuous progression and hiccups along the way. Now look at them, a mature group of players that are performing on a world level. That's taken time and to expect it to take less time in the 15s programme is naïve."
'You have to deal with the worst day of someone's life, then reassure the next patient nothing's wrong'
"When you are surrounded by death and disease, aggressive and drunk patients, it can make working in A&E an interesting and often stressful environment" - Nick Edwards, In Stitches: The Highs and Lows of Life as an A&E Doctor
"Rugby is great. The players don't wear helmets or padding; they just beat the living daylights out of each other and then go for a beer. I love that" - Joe Theismann
There seems little logical explanation for how Molloy has combined two exceptionally fast-paced ways of life and succeeded. So how has she?
"It's hard going. And it's only getting more difficult to be honest. It's a great evolvement of the game that there are so many full-time players now. In Bristol we have a strong cohort. Everyone is progressing to these full-time models, and it's been huge growth over the last few years.
"At the same time, it's become more and more challenging for people with jobs. It's been difficult for all our directors of rugby to be managing full-time athletes and full-time workers, it's becoming trickier and trickier, but it's a great sign for progress.
"Since retiring from Ireland, my main focus has been work. I've been in my A&E programme to become a consultant since 2015, and I can tell you it doesn't normally take that long. It's been part-time years, years out, and I've really stretched it out to juggle rugby, but there has to come a time in your life when you think about what pays the bills.
"How long do I want to work multiple night shifts in a row? Not for many more years. I'd like to step off the crazy shift pattern I'm experiencing to have a better quality of life."
Molloy also spoke about the difficulties of switching off from her day job when it comes to getting on the rugby pitch.
"The quick transition we and all healthcare providers face is the biggest challenge. In front door medicine, you have to very rapidly deal with, sometimes, the worst day of someone's life, and then you have to assess the next patient and give them the same care, dignity and respect.
"You have to give them a fair chance and not bring the emotional baggage into their situation. You could be telling someone the worst news they will ever hear, and then the next patient you could be reassuring them nothing's wrong. So that contrast of situation you experience. We're constantly under pressure, as are all A&E departments.
"Then you turn up to rugby training and you've dropped a ball, and you think in the grand scheme of things, that's not the worst thing that's happened today. Your perspective is very different, but obviously you come into this environment in Bristol and what's demanded of you is professionalism and accuracy in a highly competitive environment. You can't really be bringing in your baggage either. It's a challenge.
"A bad day at work for me might look very different to our full-time athletes, or teachers or students. It's all perspective and different pressures and stresses."
Molloy has overseen many changes and developments to women's rugby over the years, but has called for further development and support.
"There's been great progress with women's rugby, but there is obviously still progress to be made. There are issues ongoing. The women's game still needs support and development. The TNT broadcast deal is massive, and Sky Sports' relationship with the Red Roses as well. That commercial viability of the game is key going forward.
"Rugby is looking at competing against other sports. It's got to be accessible and seen for the game to be sustainable. A much richer environment, giving different perspectives. We don't want to hear from the same people from the same group.
"I hope the boards become more diverse and it's not just women's rugby looking at a bunch of men, and that we're represented on these boards as well so the decision making is not just done with their perspective.
"We need to see women's rugby as a unique product. It's not just the men's game with slightly different sized people. It offers a lot."
