Latest news with #ClaudiaMacDonald
BBC News
29-05-2025
- Business
- BBC News
Ireland hooker Moloney signs new Exeter contract
Exeter's Ireland hooker Cliodhna Moloney has extended her contract for the 2025-26 Premiership Women's Rugby season. The 31-year-old moved to Sandy Park in 2022 after Wasps' women's side disbanded and has gone on to score 24 tries for the Devon was recalled to the Ireland squad this year and played in all five of their Six Nations games this season. The announcement comes a day after her wife - England winger Claudia MacDonald - also signed a new deal with the Chiefs. "Cli has been a crucial part of our squad over the last three years," interim head coach Steve Salvin said."She brings so much experience and rugby nous to every game she plays in. "We look forward to her returning to Sandy Park post-World Cup and continuing her career with us."
Yahoo
28-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
England's MacDonald signs new Exeter deal
Claudia MacDonald scored against France on her last England appearance in the Six Nations last month [Rex Features] Exeter's England winger Claudia MacDonald has signed a new contract for the 2025-26 Premiership Women's Rugby season. The 29-year-old, who has won 35 England caps, joined the club in 2022 and has scored 25 tries in 29 games during a spell that has been hampered by a serious neck injury. Advertisement MacDonald earned an England recall during this year's Six Nations and is aiming to be part of the squad for the upcoming World Cup. She was part of the side that made the last World Cup final in New Zealand in 2021, coming on as a second-half replacement in the final. "Claudia is a world-class player, as shown by her performances in the Six Nations," interim head coach Steve Salvin told the club website. "She worked so hard to recover from her injury and is always a positive influence around the team. Her aim right now is obviously the World Cup, but when she returns, I think we will see an even better version of her at club level."
BBC News
28-05-2025
- General
- BBC News
England's MacDonald signs new Exeter deal
Exeter's England winger Claudia MacDonald has signed a new contract for the 2025-26 Premiership Women's Rugby 29-year-old, who has won 35 England caps, joined the club in 2022 and has scored 25 tries in 29 games during a spell that has been hampered by a serious neck injury. MacDonald earned an England recall during this year's Six Nations and is aiming to be part of the squad for the upcoming World was part of the side that made the last World Cup final in New Zealand in 2021, coming on as a second-half replacement in the final. "Claudia is a world-class player, as shown by her performances in the Six Nations," interim head coach Steve Salvin told the club website."She worked so hard to recover from her injury and is always a positive influence around the team. Her aim right now is obviously the World Cup, but when she returns, I think we will see an even better version of her at club level."
Times
25-04-2025
- Sport
- Times
Claudia MacDonald: People assumed I was a boy because I had muscles
An England coach asked Claudia MacDonald, after her third cap, how it felt to play at Twickenham. Her response was that she hadn't, really, because she came on so late. Starting on the wing against France in 2023 was an occasion she could certainly count. On Saturday, she will be there from the off once again, for a grand-slam decider against the same opposition. Every time MacDonald has taken to the Twickenham turf, her presence has been a little triumph. That she was there in 2018, when the Red Roses played Ireland after the men had beaten Australia, was remarkable because she had taken up rugby only three years previously, at Durham University. For the 2023 game against France — another grand-slam decider, in front of a crowd of 58,498 — she was not far removed from a career-threatening neck injury that kept her out of internationals for ten months before the previous year's World Cup. This weekend will be her third cap since another neck injury left her afraid of leaving the house and, again, contemplating whether she would ever play again. Absent from Red Roses duty between November 2023 and March 2025, MacDonald has excelled on her restoration, scoring three tries against Italy and Scotland and retaining the No11 jersey for the final match of the championship. 'Sometimes you have to stop and reflect and look at the last year and a half and go, 'I've come such a long way,' ' MacDonald, 29, says. 'Mo [Natasha Hunt, the scrum half] is actually incredibly good at reminding me of that journey that I've been on, and just to relax and enjoy it and smile.' Though MacDonald did not take up rugby until she was an undergraduate, she had been around the sport, spending part of her childhood in Dubai before attending St John's School in Leatherhead for sixth form. Her family watched men's internationals and she liked to imitate Jonny Wilkinson's kicking routine, and she and her brother, Alex, would play slow-motion rugby in the lounge to the tune of Banana Pancakes by Jack Johnson. One of the reasons she waited until she was 19 to have a proper go was because of her experiences of a girls' game nearby while she was watching her brothers play. 'There weren't very many nice comments thrown at it,' she says. 'It was all, 'Oh, they're uncoordinated, they're unfit, they're rubbish at rugby'. Everyone being told they're gay and whatever else. That was something that I struggled with a little bit when I was younger: people assuming that I was gay or that I was a boy because I was muscular and sporty. 'I didn't want to necessarily step into that because then I thought, 'Oh, those same comments are going to be thrown at me'. But no, that wasn't the case at all. I've met some of the most girly people I've ever met in my entire life playing rugby. There's a whole range of people playing. I think that's just amazing.' When MacDonald arrived at Durham in 2015, she was a netball player. Her college, Josephine Butler, had a mixed rugby team with the nearby Van Mildert and she coyly decided to turn up to training one evening. She looked far from a novice and the next day she went to a university session. It was not long before she was playing for Darlington Mowden Park and, upon graduation, for Wasps and England, as a professional when 15s contracts returned in January 2019. MacDonald is unequivocally a wing now, but she has oscillated between the flanks and scrum half (the RFU still lists her as a No9). Scott Bemand, the former England attack coach who is now Ireland's head coach, encouraged her to switch from the back three, and it was there that her international career began. At the 2022 World Cup, MacDonald started out wide in the semi-final and had a hand in the try of the tournament. Receiving the ball on her tryline, she jinked through physios and Canadian defenders, hurled a pass out to Abby Dow and watched her fellow wing run in from 70 metres. Come the final, MacDonald was on the bench and played the last half-hour of the gutting defeat by New Zealand at scrum half. 'I can't really remember much of the game, but I'd like to hope I did an all right job,' she says. MacDonald was back on the wing for the following Six Nations, but missed last year's championship because of the neck injury, meaning she was pitch-side on BBC duty for the Twickenham fixture against Ireland, analysing not only her team-mates, but also Cliodhna Moloney, her fiancée on the opposition bench. INSTAGRAM Though this year's crowd is not expected to reach the levels of the past two editions, it will be another significant occasion for the Red Roses. Whether as replacement scrum half, pundit or first-choice wing, MacDonald's presence is testament to her ability and resilience. 'That France game two years ago was just one of the most surreal moments I've ever experienced in rugby,' she says. 'I'd certainly never experienced that coach journey, which is what really sticks out in my head. We left the Lensbury [hotel in Teddington] and it took us so much longer to get to Twickenham than we ever anticipated. 'We were all — well, I certainly was anyway — glued up to the window because I couldn't believe the number of people that were out on the streets, the people that were in the pubs and as they saw us come past, they all came out on to the streets cheering us on.' England v France Women's Six Nations Twickenham Saturday, 4.45pm TV BBC2
BBC News
19-04-2025
- Sport
- BBC News
'Fitter and stronger' MacDonald stakes wing spot
"I was terrified to be anywhere near a rugby pitch or a rugby ball."Following a second neck injury in February 2024, the thought of playing again was a huge ask for England wing Claudia MacDonald, who had already considered retirement.A comeback that seemed nearly impossible, when MacDonald barely left her house after being told not to go in a car, is now at an unimageable 29-year-old picked up the player-of-the-match award after scoring two tries in a convincing win over Scotland in the Women's Six has not just come back on the biggest stage, but is thriving and pushing for a starting spot against France in Saturday's Grand Slam decider at Allianz Stadium."I'm just loving every second of being back," a beaming MacDonald told the BBC. "We're just surrounded by so many talents - amazing, incredible rugby players."It's a privilege to put the shirt on. To be picked out today, player of the match? It makes me a bit emotional to be honest."The best is yet to come. Look at the skill we have throughout the squad. People say we need to be beaten but we beat each other up in training and push each other so hard."Having only returned in Exeter's Premiership Women's Rugby defeat by eventual champions Gloucester-Hartpury last December, John Mitchell decided to select MacDonald in his Six Nations more than 12 months away from the Red Roses, she scored on her return against Italy in round one, but had to wait until the game against Scotland in Leicester to get a second Breach's form in MacDonald's absence has made getting back into the side difficult, with the Saracens wing scoring four tries in last year's Six Nations.A brilliant take in the air and some nifty footwork helped MacDonald break through the Scotland defence early in the game, but her final pass failed to find full-back Ellie her electric start continued throughout the game as she again showed her balanced running to slice through and this time round the final defender for England's fourth Exeter Chief, who can also play at scrum-half, then grabbed another try in the second half, showing her punchy and deceptively quick running style to race clear down the left said she had to "learn to trust her body again", MacDonald is back in the form that saw her start England's World Cup semi-final win over Canada in 2022."Coming back from a double neck injury is all about whether you are going to be brave," former England captain Katy Daley-McLean told the BBC."Can you still be brave and play in that same way? For me Claudia doesn't look like she has been away."She looks fitter and stronger and really powerful. We know she is a balanced runner but she had some smart touches off the ball as well." MacDonald only started playing rugby at Durham University as a 19-year-old, before a rapid rise in the sport saw her capped in 2018 by the age of the World Cup final defeat by New Zealand, where the Exeter Chiefs utility back came off the bench, it seemed natural that MacDonald would cement a spot in the Red Roses' starting back is yet to score this Six Nations after only returning in February from a hip injury sustained in Mia Venner arguably is the quickest out of the trio and is also back in the selection mix after an impressive try-scoring return to international rugby against Italy."The thing that has changed MacDonald's game is her handling and comfort under the high ball," former England fly-half Daley-McLean told BBC's Rugby Union Weekly."She looks born to do that now and she hasn't always had that."The balance to her game now puts a bit of pressure on John Mitchell as Jess Breach has come back in decent form from a long-term injury, and you can't leave Abby Dow out."You have two wingers then fighting for the one spot." 'There are plenty of headaches' Mitchell has heavily rotated his squad throughout the Six Nations to build "two teams" before a home World Cup that starts in might not have been planning to start MacDonald in the Grand Slam-decider when pencilling in his best team at the start of the tournament, but the New Zealander acknowledged he has a few tough calls to make this week."There are plenty of headaches for me, it's a great side to select," Mitchell told the BBC."I have to sit down at home and make a few cups of tea and go through the spreadsheet to pick the side. We have two or three areas of selection I really have to think about."When Mitchell is having his cup of tea and moving names around on his spreadsheet next week, MacDonald might be moved from a versatile squad option to a genuine starter, which was unthinkable not long ago.
