Current Ireland set-up 'worlds apart' from Moloney's previous experience

“Things have changed quite a lot, I think that kind of reflects the landscape of women's rugby worldwide."

Cliodhna Moloney during an Ireland women's rugby press conference at IRFU High Performance Centre in Dublin. Photo by Shauna Clinton/Sportsfile

Cliodhna Moloney has said the current Ireland women’s rugby set-up under Scott Bemand is ‘worlds apart’ from what she had experienced in the past.

Having picked up her 31st Irish cap in a test victory against Japan on November 20, 2021, the Galway woman had to wait more than two years for her 32nd appearance as an international 15s player. While the Japanese game took place 11 days after she compared remarks made by the IRFU’s then Director of Women’s Rugby Anthony Eddy to “slurry spreading” in a social media post, new head coach Greg McWilliams insisted her exclusion from the squad for the 2022 Six Nations was purely a ‘rugby decision’.