York Vision Sport Deputy Editor Jacob Bassford spoke with Jodie Ounsley (Fury on BBC’s Gladiators) and City of York Council Leader Cllr Claire Douglas as the brand new Women’s Rugby World Cup trophy visits York on its tour of England, ahead of the tournament this summer.
On Monday 2nd June, York Vision was invited to Parliament Square in York City Centre as the brand new Women’s Rugby World Cup trophy was on its penultimate stage of an eight-stop tour of the host locations across England. To mark the event, Jodie Ounsley and Claire Douglas were in attendance and were speaking to local media, including Vision as well as BBC Radio York, BBC Look North and ITV Calendar Yorkshire.
With the World Cup already a record-breaking tournament and will be the biggest and most accessible celebration of women’s rugby ever, this is not an opportunity York will want to squander. Over 300,000 tickets have already been sold for the tournament, more than double from the last World Cup in New Zealand in 2021. The new trophy going on tour of the country is part of the organiser’s effort to bring the competition around the country and have it as accessible as possible.
Sat on branded WRWC summer deck chairs, I spoke with Jodie Ounsley about the trophy and her excitement ahead of the games being hosted in York. Jodie is recently retired from rugby union (having last played for Exeter Chiefs Women in the PWR in April 2024), and is most known for appearing as ‘Fury’ in the first season of BBC’s revamped Gladiators game show in 2024.
Firstly, I asked Jodie what her thoughts were on the new trophy, on display for the general public to see. She responded how “I’ve literally just seen it now and it looks amazing. And I think it’s such a great idea of a tour and everyone gets to see it in different locations – people who might not even know about the World Cup happening to see it.” She added how seeing the new trophy made the impending tournament “feel real now.”
Seeing the trophy pictured within the magnificence of York Minster certainly adds to the occasion. But whilst York is known for many things such as the grandeur and imposing nature of its world-famous minster, it is less known for international sport. On this, I asked Jodie, who hails from Dewsbury in West Yorkshire, on the significance of York being one of the host locations of the World Cup. She said “I think it’s huge because obviously with rugby, as we’re seeing in the women’s game, it’s either down south or in the Manchester area, but you never really see it proper up north in York, so I think it’s really important. Especially for young girls and young kids to see fixtures and big tournaments happen like this, and being able to [see it] at home and seeing it in real life can really spark a lot of important memories for kids. So I think it’s really cool. And it’s just another way to grow the game!”
With fixtures featuring tournament favourites Canada, six-time champions New Zealand, the USA, Australia, Fiji, South Africa, Japan, Samoa, and Spain, the crowds will be spoilt for choice in terms of number of teams and superstars. These include Ilona Maher, Portia Woodman, Alex Tessier, Azeze Hele, Beatrice Rigioni, and Claudia Pena (honestly the list is endless). With that in mind, I was very keen on wanting to know which fixture Jodie was particularly looking forward to.
Jodie noted how “with such a wide range of games, it’s just going to be different, it’s going to be exciting. And again for people just to see that, it’s going to be huge.”
England, also known as the Red Roses, are the clear bookies’ favourite to win the tournament, but as the saying goes it’s not over until it’s over and I was curious to know if Jodie had a ‘hot take’ ahead of the tournament. Jodie responded “we know from the last World Cup anything can happen. And I think, as we’ve seen this year, the teams are just all levelling up, like the women’s game is just growing and growing. There are teams that you won’t even expect to be even in the equation doing well. So I’m excited to see New Zealand this team especially with Portia Woodman coming back out of retirement.”
History is on Jodie’s side for her prediction to watch out for the Black Ferns (New Zealand). For two World Cups in a row, a dominant England side has fallen unexpectedly short in a final to the Black Ferns. Will history repeat itself, or will the likes of Canada, France and a quickly improving Ireland have anything to say about this year’s tournament?
Also in attendance at this trophy event was City of York Council Leader Cllr Claire Douglas. I had a chance to speak with her too on her excitement around the tournament, logistical challenges and the long-term impact of the World Cup on York and North Yorkshire. Like Jodie, I also asked her about her excitement about York being one of the locations.
Cllr Douglas was clear in her enthusiasm when she said that, “Oh, it’s absolutely fantastic. We’re really excited to welcome these amazing athletes into our city and it just adds to the general vibrancy around our local sports teams, it’s huge.”
As covered by Vision, York had the honour of kicking off the Red Roses’ Six Nations campaign against Italy on the 23rd March. Whilst a big occasion for the city and a chance for World Cup organisers to test the logistics of holding international women’s rugby union at the Community Stadium, the occasion was marred by horrendous traffic and insufficient parking, so I asked Cllr Douglas if since that game the council has planned contingencies to ease flow of traffic for supporters (as well as shoppers accessing Monks Cross) and introduce overflow car parks.
This was her response: “The organisers of the World Cup fixtures [in York] are very focused on making sure it’s a great experience for all of the people attending games. Therefore, travel is a big part of that and the park and ride shuttle buses and parking at the stadium will all be coordinated to make sure everybody has a great day.”
Image (Jacob Bassford)
Subsequently, I then asked Cllr Douglas about whether she had a particular fixture she was looking forward to seeing in York this summer. She said, “Oh, that’s a hard one. I mean there’s some amazing games, aren’t there? I’m really looking forward to the first game between Canada and Fiji on the 23rd of August because it’s going to create big excitement around the city for the tournament.” The Council Leader continued to list the teams that she was excited to see play in York, alongside all their superstars in tow.
Finally, with York hosting six pool stage matches of the Rugby World Cup (the joint-second of all the venues behind Sandy Park in Exeter), and already hosted a Women’s Six Nations fixture and had England Men do open training sessions for two seasons in a year, the city has made a considerable investment in rugby union in recent years. This alongside being the home of the defending Women’s Super League champions for two years in a row in women’s rugby league with York Valkyrie and York City FC men only just missing out on promotion to the English Football League this season represents an upward curve in the city’s general sporting fortunes since the opening of the Community Stadium in 2021. Furthermore, as Jodie noted in her interview, women’s rugby union in Premiership Women’s Rugby, the top division, is scarce in the north outside of Manchester since Darlington withdrew from the league in 2023. Thus with this considerable investment in WRWC 2025, I asked Cllr Douglas what was the council’s long term goal after the tournament.
Cllr Douglas responded that the council’s intention was around community “sports and activity, it’s a really important part of our city and actually York has been told that we are one of the most active cities in the country at the moment. So, our levels of inactivity amongst the general population are really low compared to the vast majority of other places in England. And really, it’s all about making sure that as many people as possible who want to get involved can do so, and that’s through our community games and through our semi-professional and professional sports teams across the [city]. So in the long term, we just want people to get out there, be active, get involved in their communities, whether that’s sporting or otherwise. We have our Community Stadium, a fantastic venue, we want to maximise its use and our local sports clubs. So our long term aim is to get as many people involved in sport as possible.”
Tickets are now back on general sale – available at tickets.rugbyworldcup.com. For the latest tournament updates and fixture details, visit rugbyworldcup.com/2025.