Women to make Olympics effort

The IRFU have announced the structures and pathway which they hope will take an Irish women’s team to the 2013 Rugby World Cup Sevens, and possibly the 2016 Olympics — but there will be no similar initiative in the men’s game.

A union spokesman confirmed there are two reasons for their continued refusal to give the green light to a serious stab at the men’s reduced format: finance and the lack of a confirmed qualifying process for the Games in Rio de Janeiro in four years’ time.

Of the two, finance is clearly the bigger bugbear.

The IRFU undertook a working review of what it would cost to commit to an Irish men’s sevens side 18 months ago and came up with a figure of €1m per annum, which would incorporate everything from player contracts to travel costs and backup staff.

“Where would that money come from?” asked union spokesman Karl Richardson yesterday. “From the club game or from one or all of the provinces? We are not prepared to do that and sacrifice success in other areas to do it.”

The women’s side will consist of amateur players and their circuit will involve significantly fewer tournaments and travel and thus cost a fraction of that figure. Their bid for a place at the 2013 world event started with an interprovincial blitz at the beginning of April that allowed newly-named national coach John Skurr the chance to assess the players’ capabilities and adaptability to the sevens game.

Skurr selected a squad of 21 players which he will work with through weekend camps and rotate through warm-up tournaments in Kinsale, Amsterdam and Bournemouth during May and June.

The squad contains a number of experienced members of the women’s team that won three of their five fixtures in this season’s Six Nations, among them Ireland’s most capped player Lynne Cantwell.