Rugby World Cup 2025: Zoe Aldcroft & England quest for redemption
Aldercroft, 28, returned home to England and for the first time since she started playing with her brother at Scarborough Rugby Club at the age of eight, she didn’t enjoy rugby.
“Personally, I’m very embarrassed about it because people keep talking about how good we are and how we won all these games in a row but we couldn’t win the final game,” she said.
“I didn’t want to see anyone for two weeks and I was really scared to go back to rugby. I remember the day I had to go back to training at Gloucester Hartpury and I thought, ‘I don’t want to do this’.” .
But she did it. Her club teammates picked her up. At the end of that season, they lifted the Premier League Women’s Rugby (PWR) trophy together. In June, they defended their title.
Aldercroft was named captain earlier this month and will lead the Red Roses’ search for redemption as the Rugby World Cup kicks off in England in August.
Aldercroft believes England will only have a victory in the final at Twickenham’s Allianz Stadium on September 27 for their emotions to be the same as those they felt on the other side of the world three years ago on the contrary.
“We need reflection in the final so if adversity comes again (we can deal with it). We don’t know what’s going to happen on the day – how can we best manage it and put ourselves in a position where are we unstoppable?” she said. .
It would complete an arc that encompasses everything Oldcroft loved about the game.
“I love going to those dark places, especially with my teammates,” she said.
“I just love that feeling of doing your best, risking your life, and everyone doing that for each other. That really inspires me.”
England hope that momentum will take them to the top of world football this year.
