Jess Breach: Red Roses are the Women's Six Nations team to beat

It is rare for an interview to begin in the ladies’ loos at a film premiere on Regent’s Street, with the interviewer unzipping the dress of the interviewee so she can use the bathroom, followed by the proper interview at a rugby ground the next day. Such is the busy schedule of a Red Rose now. Jess Breach, the England and Saracens back, is six months into finding out that winning a World Cup means you are suddenly in demand for glamorous events in the evenings before lacing up your boots for rugby training in the morning.

The night before, Breach was in a black mini dress and heels, posing for photos with her England team-mates at the premiere of a new documentary about the Red Roses’ journey to winning the Rugby World Cup last September. There are challenges to balancing a busy diary with rugby duties, Breach explains while gesturing to her bruised and grazed legs. “The grazes make it hard to fake tan.”

Now Breach is in her training kit, sitting in the stands of Saracens’ StoneX Stadium, reflecting on how much has changed since England lifted the trophy at a sold-out Allianz Stadium on 27 September. “It’s been really crazy,” the 28-year-old says. “Obviously we have dreamed about it for ages, and with the loss of the previous World Cup, you think it’s not going to become real and then when it does, it feels surreal”.

With 53 caps, 53 tries, and 53 wins for England, Breach is a world champion who has never lost a game in an England shirt. Still, her overriding emotion when the final whistle blew that day was relief. England won the final 33-13, ending the 11-year wait for the trophy.

“We said we didn’t feel pressure, but we did have a lot of pressure to win it in our home country in front of a record crowd, and I think the pressure for women’s rugby was a lot as well,” Breach, who was England’s top try scorer at the World Cup with six tries, says. “We wanted to showcase it to the world and show our fans that we can do it. And for us to do it under that amount of pressure, I think we should have confidence going into anything now.

“We also didn’t know there were going to be that many people. I think all of us thought that people weren’t going to turn up, or maybe half the tickets were sold to New Zealand fans. But then when we got off the bus, and seeing the fans there to cheer us in was just so special.”

The great high of lifting the World Cup was preceded by the “lowest time” in Breach’s career, after the 2022 World Cup loss to New Zealand. “I had only played one game in the tournament, and didn’t feel valued within the squad. It was rubbish. I actually picked up an injury there which was worse than they had thought, so I was training through pain and still not getting selected,” she says. Players say the culture in the England squad during that time, under former head coach Simon Middleton’s leadership, was tense.

The Red Roses were coached to last year’s World Cup success by John Mitchell, the former All Blacks coach who had a reputation in the men’s game as a fierce character. He has been softened by his time with the Red Roses, allowing Ellie Kildunne to give him a tattoo and taking part in TikTok dance videos with Breach. “I can’t even put into words how different it feels,” she says. “I think anyone can speak up now. That’s the environment we have created – it’s a safe space and anybody’s opinion is valid. I think that’s why we were so successful, everyone individually was valued and appreciated and expressed that on the pitch.”

Much has changed in the players’ lives outside of rugby, including the bonus money and lucrative sponsorship contracts that appeared with the World Cup win, which have made life more comfortable for the country’s top players. A surprising change, however, is the number of times they get recognised. Sadia Kabeya, England’s formidable forward, recalled being in a harness at an outdoor activity centre when someone shouted up to her to say they were a fan. “I get recognised now, which is lovely, but I still find it so strange,” Breach says, remembering a recent time she heard a family whispering her name before telling her what huge fans they are.

England will return to the Allianz Stadium on 11 April, for the first time since they won the World Cup, when they face Ireland in the opening match of the Women’s Six Nations. Over 67,000 tickets have been sold, with fans seemingly undeterred by the lack of competitiveness – England haven’t lost a Six Nations match since 2018. “I think it’s a new challenge for us, every team is going to be coming for us, every team wants to beat the world champions. Actually it gives us a chance to play different styles and I think that’s really exciting. We’re in a new World Cup cycle, and we can really push ourselves to showcase maybe what was missed in the World Cup,” Breach says.

There is also the inaugural women’s British and Irish Lions tour next year, but Breach says her thoughts are only on the season ahead. “We don’t even know who the coach is, there’s so much unknown that I can’t really think about it yet. I want to win the PWR with Saracens, I want to win the Six Nations, and I want a grand slam win with England,” she says.

The Lions tour will take place in New Zealand, which did not attract many travelling fans for the 2022 World Cup. “We want to create our own identity with it [the Lions],” Breach says. Would she have started the women’s Lions tour in New Zealand? “I think that’s where we could have created a bit more of our own identity,” she says. “The way English, Welsh, Scottish and Irish fans are so behind women’s rugby, if we brought New Zealand here, it would have been a fantastic tournament. Hopefully, we go to New Zealand and they get great crowds and they think ‘OK, let’s host it at home’, because I just feel it would be so good for fans who can’t afford to go on to New Zealand”.

Breach’s immediate attention is on Saracens’ match against Sale Sharks at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on Saturday. “I love playing in football stadiums,” she says. A win would help the team reclaim the title from Gloucester-Hartpury.

With talk of future success on the horizon, the conversation returns to the celebrations after the World Cup final. The following afternoon, the Red Roses appeared at Battersea Power Station, stumbling off the bus with sunglasses on, appearing to have the hangovers to end all hangovers. “I don’t think anyone was hungover,” Breach says to correct the record. “I think everyone was still drunk.”