rugby

Rugby World Cup winner Lark Atkin-Davies has announced she is pregnant with her first child.

The Bristol Bears hooker has not played for her club during this Premiership Women’s Rugby season.

Atkin-Davies has 74 caps for the Red Roses and played in all six matches, scoring three tries, as England won the World Cup on home soil in September.

In a video posted on her Instagram, the 30-year-old said she was due in June.

Bristol Bears said they “can’t wait to welcome a new bear cub”.

Atkin-Davies made her England debut in 2015.

Her England and Bristol team-mate Abbie Ward gave birth to a daughter in 2023, returning to the sport just 17 weeks later.

England players are entitled to 26 weeks’ fully-paid maternity leave, as well as funds for children to travel to games with them, after the Rugby Football Union updated its maternity policy in February 2023.

Former head coach Holley was part of the Ospreys coaching staff who between 2003 and 2012 won four league titles and an Anglo-Welsh Cup .

The 55-year-old former full-back, who hails from Aberavon, says the region’s faithful would not support losing their side.

“To Ospreys fans, it probably confirms to them what is going on behind the scenes that is not being made public,” said Holley.

“There is an air of sadness, anger, disbelief. Your average fan takes things on face value.

“Let’s talk hard facts. Who has been the most successful region?”

Holley highlights anger among Ospreys fans who he says “won’t entertain” a potential 40-mile trip to watch rugby in Cardiff.

“They are die-hard fans who have gone through the hardships of the 2000s, established a brand and have two generations of supporters who have only known Ospreys,” he said.

“Ospreys are doing good things in the community and on the field are still reasonably competitive because they have that culture.

“Ospreys people will say they are one true region. That must count for something as well as the success.

“It is a hot-bed of Welsh rugby. Swansea, Neath, Aberavon or Bridgend. But there has always been the feeling the Ospreys have been the target, the ones to go and that creates the anger.”

And Holley, who also coached Bristol to English rugby’s top-flight warns Welsh rugby has reached a critical juncture.

“We are on the precipice, we don’t realise how close we are to losing our game,” he said.

Ireland will meet Scotland in the group stage of a Rugby World Cup once again as they were drawn together in Pool D for the 2027 competition in Australia alongside Uruguay and Portugal.

Ireland were 36-14 winners when the sides met in the 2023 tournament in France, while they claimed a 27-3 win against the same opponents in Japan in 2019.

Scotland’s last win against Ireland came in the 2017 Six Nations, but you have to go all the way back to 1991 for their last victory over Ireland at a World Cup.

While Scotland are familiar foes, there is fresh World Cup opposition with Ireland to face Uruguay and Portugal for the first time at the sport’s showpiece event.

Ireland’s last meeting with Portugal occurred in July as they ran up a record score in a 106-7 win during their summer tour.

The top two teams in each of the six pools will qualify for the knockout phase, as-well-as the four best third-placed teams.

The winner of Pool D will face one of the teams who finished third in the round of 16, while the second-place team in Pool D are set to take on the winner of Pool E which contains France, Japan, USA and Samoa.