Women’s Lions ‘must be based on form’ after tour gets early green light

Former England international Shaunagh Brown has backed the idea of a women’s Lions tour following a feasibility report but insisted that the squad must only be made up of the best players and not employ quotas to stop English dominance.

The study, funded by Royal London, investigated key aspects of what would make up a Lions tour with the results deemed positive. Details on structure, timing and opposition are yet to be decided, with any inaugural tour not expected for a number of years.

“This is a massive day and a massive first step,” 27-cap Brown told City A.M. 

Lions to move on women’s game

“The next stages are going to be when we put meat on the bones of who we will play, where, when, and potentially how the team will be made up. For me the team would be made up of the best of the best and there wouldn’t be special dispensation for different home nations for different reasons.”

The men’s tour currently takes place every four years and sees a squad made up of English, Welsh, Irish and Scottish players travel to Australia, New Zealand and South Africa on a rotational basis. 

Those three host nations are not all at the summit of the women’s game and any future women’s Lions tour would need to cater for the best teams within the women’s game – the likes of Canada and France, as well as New Zealand.

But with the study comes a clean slate of what a women’s tour could look like. Do the home nations host it rather than travel, do the touring sides also play British and Irish clubs on any home tour, or do the Lions play a mixture of overseas talent, such as a New Zealand-Australia XV?

“Why not [host a tour]?,” Brown added. “There’s a lot of rugby purists who would go: ‘nope, a Lions tour must tour’ but for me [teams] could tour the United Kingdom and Ireland and even if you talk logistically about who is playing and what contractual state our players will be in, there might have to be considerations around how long we can keep the girls in camp if they are still being employed.

“Hopefully there will be a set of full professional players at that point but we don’t know so there’s a lot of considerations around what will happen. For me, touring the UK would very much be an option.”

The chief executive of the British and Irish Lions Ben Caveley added: “It is extremely positive that a British and Irish Lions women’s tour is possible.”