Mentality monsters & million-dollar rivals - who can upset England?

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2025 Women's Rugby World Cup
Venue: England Date: 22 August- 27 September
Coverage: Every match involving England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland live on either BBC One or BBC Two, while every game will be live on the BBC iPlayer and the BBC Sport website and BBC Sport app, with coverage on BBC Radio 5 Live, Sport Extra, the BBC Sport website and app
The plan was born in the belly of Eden Park.
Fourteen weeks ago, the Black Ferns gathered for a gym session at the New Zealand rugby's spiritual home.
It's a functional space; strip lighting, bench presses, pull-up bars and the tang of stale sweat.
But before the work-out started, something out of the ordinary occurred.
Allan Bunting, the team's director of rugby, stood up before his team.
"I have seen some amazing things on the field, but you need to know what our weapon is," he said.
"It's a mentality.
"When we are tired and feel like we can just be safe and hold, that when we've got to go.
"That's where big games are won."
After exhorting his team to meet fear, fatigue and pressure with energy, Bunting did the same.
Saying he was "really scared" about the next part of his presentation, Bunting stripped to his waist and performed a full-throated haka to his team.
"It was about stepping into your discomfort... stepping into your courage and into your gifts and what you've inherited from your ancestors," he reflected later.
The inheritance left by the Black Ferns who have gone before is rich. Eight times they have been to the Women's Rugby World Cup, six times they have lifted the trophy. Every final they have played, they have won.
Wherever the big game has been staged, the Black Ferns have found a way.
Bunting's pep talk landed. Hard.
Later that week, after an emotional rendition of the national anthem. New Zealand demolished the United States 79-14.
Seven of their 13 tries came from Portia Woodman-Wickliffe.
The 34-year-old, part of the New Zealand teams that won the World Cup in 2017 and 2022, came out of retirement a month earlier to bring top-end pace and tournament know-how to the group.
At the other end of her career, 18-year-old full-back and rising star Braxton Sorenson-McGee could be one of the break-out successes of the tournament.
Ruahei Demant, a former World Player of the Year, will steer the side from 10, just as she did in the team's World Cup final win over England three years ago.
Ultimately though, it might be that collective belief, rather than any one star, that is New Zealand's biggest weapon.
Bunting was first called into the Black Ferns set-up back in 2022.
On the pitch, the Black Ferns had lost their four games in a row, with England beating them by a record 43-12 and then improving that mark with a 56-15 victory the following week.
But Bunting's remit was off the pitch.
Having taken the women's sevens team to Olympic gold the year before, he was tasked with rebuilding 15-a-side unity and culture amid rifts and allegations of favouritism and disrespect.
Seven months later, riding the home support, the Black Ferns triumphed 34-31 over England in the biggest match of all. It was the fifth time New Zealand have beaten England in a World Cup final.
It is a streak of supremacy that casts a shadow across the confidence of the Red Roses.
Canada raising funds and increasing in confidence
When Rugby Canada launched a fundraising drive to support their women's team's campaign in March, they were not coy about their ambitions.
It was christened Mission: Win Rugby World Cup. And why shouldn't it be?
Canada are the closest challengers to England in the world rankings and over the past two years only the Red Roses have beaten them.
Those scorelines against England have become slimmer over that time as well.
In their most recent meeting – at last year's WXV event - Canada led into the final 15 minutes, before a last-play try gave England a flattering nine-point margin of victory.
Sophie de Goede missed that match. The back row, a two-time member of World Rugby's team of the year, spent a year on the sidelines after tearing knee ligaments, but made her comeback in July.
She, like many of her team-mates, will feel right at home in England.
Half of Canada's 32-strong squad are contracted to PWR clubs, including their captain and talismanic centre Alex Tessier, who plays for Exeter.
Intriguingly there is also English influence behind the scenes with Alex Austerberry, winner of two domestic titles with Saracens, working as an assistant coach.
A clutch of players from the Canadian Sevens team that won Olympic silver in Paris last summer strengthens the backline. Centre Florence Symonds, who scored two high-class tries in the warm-up win over Ireland, is in ominously good form.
Canada pushed England all the way at the last Rugby World Cup, edged out 26-19 in a physical semi-final. Expect a similarly powerful forward pack, with some quicksilver runners and astute playmakers in the backline.
With more than 88% of their million Canadian dollar target (£530,000) raised though, their preparations for this year's tournament have been much more extensive with funded training camps and warm-up matches.
"When was the last time Canada won a world championship at a sport where ice was not involved?" asked Rugby Canada chief executive Nathan Bombrys, underlining the significance of a maiden Women's Rugby World Cup win, while underestimating England's autumn weather.
Fresh France hope to accumulate form
Two points, a world of difference.
At the last Rugby World Cup, it could easily have been France lining up against England in the final. Caroline Drouin's missed last-gasp penalty allowed New Zealand to escape 25-24 in the semi-final.
Earlier this year, they came closer than anyone has to breaking England's current 27-match winning run, falling just short of pooping the Grand Slam party with a 43-42 defeat at Twickenham.
Had those scorelines crumbled a different way, Les Bleues would perhaps be seen as the most likely to derail England's home-favourite hype train.
As it is, the French are positioning themselves as distinct underdogs, describing their team as "ambitious outsiders" aiming to "put themselves in the best possible position to compete with the world's top three".
Expectations were tempered by their final warm-up match. England ran out 40-6 winners in a meeting in Mont-de-Marsan on 9 August, as the hosts were kept on the rear foot and without ball for long periods of the game.
Co-head coaches Gaelle Mignot – who captained the team at the 2014 and 2017 Women's Rugby World Cup - and David Oritz gave the team four days off to recover and recuperate in the wake of that defeat.
They will hope that a young squad, with an average age of 24, can find their rhythm in a pool that is, on world rankings at least, the weakest in the competition.
They play Italy, South Africa and Brazil.
Pauline Bourdon Sansus, who won the first of her 66 caps against England in November 2015, is the most experienced player in the squad, but will miss their opener against the Azzurri.
The 29-year-old scrum-half, the only French player to make World Rugby's 2024 team of the year, is serving a ban for criticising the officiating in the French domestic final, in which her Toulouse side lost to Stade Bordelais.
However, France have an able back-up at scrum-half in Alex Chambon and some leftfield picks to spice up their squad.
Sevens star Carla Nielsen has been recalled into the 15s set-up while Makarita Baleinadogo, the uncapped daughter of former Fiji international Dan Baleinadogo, was included despite missing out on a wider training squad earlier in the summer.
"Sometimes, it's good to take a knock right before a major competition," said co-captain Manae Feleu of the warm-up defeat by England.
"It might just allow us to hit the ground running in this World Cup."
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