Women’s Six Nations to Olympics to World Cup – Meg Jones aiming to ‘complete’ rugby

Meg Jones is a woman who rarely stands still. By her own admission, the England centre is a “live in the moment sort of girl” who, after this year’s Women’s Six Nations, will turn her attention to ticking off a rather big goal on her bucket list.

“The Paris Olympics has always been on my radar, ever since coming back to XVs,” says Jones. “I’ve still got this golden carrot that I want to chase in terms of being the first female Great Britain rugby sevens team to win a medal.”

Jones’s plan has not been inspired by the feats of Antoine Dupont or Michael Hooper, household figures in the men’s game who have turned sevens rookies in their quests to feature at this summer’s Olympics. Unlike the French icon and Australia legend, Jones is no stranger to the shorter format of the game.

She was 18 when she went to the Rio Games as a travelling reserve on the Great Britain women’s sevens team in 2016, before featuring at the 2017 XVs World Cup, where England lost to New Zealand in the final. Cardiff-born Jones would later be part of the British side that agonisingly missed out on the podium in the bronze-medal match to Fiji at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021.

As the sole Red Roses player targeting both this summer’s Games in the French capital and next year’s XVs World Cup in England, Jones, who will link up with Great Britain after the Six Nations for the Singapore and Madrid legs of the SVNS series in May, admits flitting between the two is becoming harder.

It is why, weeks after helping Great Britain’s sevens team qualify for the Paris Olympics at the European Games in Krakow last June, Jones signed for Leicester Tigers, where she has spent this season re-familiarising herself with the longer format. “The XVs game isn’t what it used to be. It’s too fast. I needed to give it that respect,” she says. “In terms of going for both [the World Cup and the Olympics] the plan is to put attitude above everything. There’s better rugby players than me but I’m willing to make mistakes and not let them affect me. I think that’s what’s got me so far.”

Yet Jones has barely put a foot wrong all season. Her partnership with Tatyana Heard was pivotal to England’s Six Nations win over Wales. During last year’s WXV competition, she singled herself out as an unpredictable playmaker in the Red Roses back-line. “I’m not a try-scorer, I create moments and that’s what I try to do in XVs,” she says, matter-of-factly. “Sevens has given me the platform and foundations of leadership, skill-set, working as a team and allowed me to hone in on those characteristics and areas.”

Few candidates are better placed to comment on the challenges sevens faces in rugby’s crowded ecosystem. Jones, who received one of the upgraded Red Roses contracts last year, is bullish about the lack of financial muscle in sevens, which, on these shores at least, has perennially struggled to win over rugby traditionalists.

“We kind of need an external sponsor for it to be its own identity,” Jones says, referencing Great Britain’s men and women’s sevens teams. “New Zealand women’s sevens players get paid more than the Black Ferns in XVs, it’s the same with the Aussie girls. They’ve got the backing, it suits their game better, whereas we’re more set-piece focused in the English game, we hound in on detail.”

In reference to England’s 26-match winning streak in the Six Nations, she adds: “Being number one helps, when you’re winning a lot on the BBC, people can’t ignore that. Some of the performances the Red Roses have put on have been incredible.”

Away from rugby, Jones has fingers in other pies. She and her long-term partner, Great Britain’s sevens team-mate Celia Quansah, have recently released a children’s story in partnership with a literacy charity, Chapter One, in which they chronicle their journeys in rugby (“We want to be visible as much as we can,” she says).

Jones also tries to consume as much of the SVNS series as she can. So what does she make of Dupont? “He’s been class,” says Jones. “I appreciate the hype that’s been around him. The bit I’ve noticed is the impact he’s had on the rest of the players in that French team. They’ve upped their game. People forget the energy that people bring. I’m hoping I can bring that sort of energy as well because that’s the player I am.”

Jones might not court the same publicity as France’s posterboy for Paris, but if she can finish this Six Nations with a flourish, realise her Parisian dream and feature at next year’s World Cup, her status as one of English rugby’s most industrious players will be secured.