ERIN KING IS quick to admit that she wasn’t sure 15s rugby was for her when she started to make the move across from 7s a few months ago.
There were a few tears of frustration as she struggled to get to grips with the many moving parts involved in lineouts.
Having been a key player for the Ireland 7s at the Olympics in Paris, a brilliant experience that included going viral on social media, King initially felt she couldn’t make the crossover into the back row in 15s.
“No, this is not for me,” she thought. “I’m a 7s player, I can’t do it.”
But she stuck at it, encouraged by her team-mates, and made her debut against Australia, delivering a big impact off the bench for the closing half hour of that impressive 36-10 win.
It was instantly clear that King could do it and she followed that first 15s cap up with excellent performances at the WXV1 tournament in Vancouver, scoring two tries off the bench in Ireland’s upset win over New Zealand before starting at blindside flanker against Canada and the US, adding another try in a win over the Americans.
Such has been King’s impact, she will be in Monaco tomorrow night for the World Rugby Awards, where she is among the nominees for women’s 15s breakthrough player of the year. 21-year-old King is in with a good shout of scooping that honour.
“I was shocked to be nominated,” says the Wicklow woman.
“I couldn’t believe it when I got the letter. I thought it was a joke and they got the wrong person.”
But few others were surprised given the impact King made in her first four Tests for Ireland in September and October.
Incredibly, her debut against Australia was just the fourth senior game of 15s rugby King had ever played. She came through with Naas RFC and featured for the Leinster and Ireland U18s but had focused solely on 7s rugby in the three years after that.
So she benefitted from joining an Ireland 15s set-up that had been improving under head coach Scott Bemand, with well-regarded assistants like defence coach Hugh Hogan, kicking coach Gareth Steenson, and forwards coach Alex Codling joining this year.
King [centre] celebrates Ireland's win over New Zealand. Travis Prior / INPHO
Travis Prior / INPHO / INPHO
King had to lean on Codling’s expertise most of all.
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“I was awful at the start, I couldn’t wrap my head around the lineouts but Codders is brilliant,” she says.
“He explained it all to me, we’d sit down every day and we’d go through them. That was the biggest struggle.”
Bemand encouraged King to back her instincts, giving her the freedom to play what she saw at the kind of speed that is the norm in 7s. Witness King’s quick-tap try against New Zealand.
“That was literally from 7s because you want to play quick. I wasn’t even really thinking, my intuition just came in.
“There’s not as much space on the pitch but all the girls have been taking the piss out of me that I’ve scored more tries in the WXV tournament than all year in the 7s.”
King was one of a few 7s internationals who switched across after the Olympics, with the likes of Amee-Leigh Murphy Crowe, Stacey Flood, Eve Higgins, Emily Lane, and Vicky Elmes Kinlan also adding speed of foot and thought.
The 7s internationals were thrilled to discover a 15s camp that was happy and optimistic. The last few years had been bleak for Irish women’s rugby but this squad play with smiles on their faces.
King says the work done by Seán Ryan, Ireland’s head of leadership and culture, has been crucial in this regard.
The squad’s theme is the ‘Green Wave,’ a term used to describe the most powerful, unbroken waves in the ocean. Ireland have made it their driving force.
“We talk about it a lot,” says King. “It’s the strongest wave in the ocean, we talk about those waves off the coast of Galway and things like that. Our team, our families, everyone who has touched the programme, past players, current players, everyone who influences our lives, they’re all part of our Green Wave. Nothing can get past us.
“Coming into the New Zealand game, we had a big focus on ‘belief versus awe.’ Playing the Black Ferns is such a big occasion, seeing the haka, and it was just about our Green Wave overcoming that, we shouldn’t be scared of them.
“It was a big challenge, but we knew that together we could beat them. We all believed.”
King in action at the Olympics. Dan Sheridan / INPHO
Dan Sheridan / INPHO / INPHO
King is back on 7s duty now. She will fly out from Monaco to Dubai on Monday ahead of the opening leg of the SVNS Series season but the plan is for her to return to the 15s set-up for the Six Nations in March.
There’s also the small matter of the 15s World Cup kicking off in August, which King hopes to be part of.
For now, she’s excited to get rolling in 7s again, having thoroughly enjoyed her experience at the Olympics even if Ireland didn’t earn the medal they had targeted. King started all of Ireland’s games as they finished eighth overall.
“It was the most amazing thing playing in the Stade de France in front of all those people, words can’t really describe the feeling,” she says.
Her remarkable lift on team-mate Emily Lane at a restart during the game against Australia went viral on social media as King’s show of strength and support gained huge traction online. By now, the clip has been viewed well over 60 million times.
“It was kind of a whirlwind coming off the pitch,” says King. “In my head, it didn’t look like that. Me and Emily practice the pods all the time and I just threw her up and knew I had to get her down.
“But after the game, her family were all like, ‘Thank you so much, you saved her’ and I didn’t know what they meant. Then the video came out.
“It was insane. I was getting emails from news people in Brazil and stuff, it was crazy. It was just mad. People were in awe of it even though we practice it all the time, maybe not to that extent!”
King loved life in the Olympic village, where she and a few team-mates got competitive about swapping the national pins that every athlete gets. She enjoyed the random conversations with athletes from different sports and different nations.
While King made waves with her lift on Lane, her fellow 7s player, Ilona Maher from the US, became a genuine global star thanks to her big social media presence.
“She’s definitely doing God’s work for us and everyone’s talking about her, which is so good for the sport,” said King.
“Going into the World Cup next year, it will just get bigger and bigger.”
Having only turned 21 in October, King is delighting in all of these new experiences as they come but her ambition for the future has only grown.
She’s already thinking of the LA Olympics in 2028, while the 15s World Cup is on the horizon, and the SVNS Series is just around the corner.
But first, the World Rugby Awards in Monaco tomorrow where King will find out if her ascendency is recognised with a big prize.
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'It was insane. I was getting emails from news people in Brazil'
ERIN KING IS quick to admit that she wasn’t sure 15s rugby was for her when she started to make the move across from 7s a few months ago.
There were a few tears of frustration as she struggled to get to grips with the many moving parts involved in lineouts.
Having been a key player for the Ireland 7s at the Olympics in Paris, a brilliant experience that included going viral on social media, King initially felt she couldn’t make the crossover into the back row in 15s.
“No, this is not for me,” she thought. “I’m a 7s player, I can’t do it.”
But she stuck at it, encouraged by her team-mates, and made her debut against Australia, delivering a big impact off the bench for the closing half hour of that impressive 36-10 win.
It was instantly clear that King could do it and she followed that first 15s cap up with excellent performances at the WXV1 tournament in Vancouver, scoring two tries off the bench in Ireland’s upset win over New Zealand before starting at blindside flanker against Canada and the US, adding another try in a win over the Americans.
Such has been King’s impact, she will be in Monaco tomorrow night for the World Rugby Awards, where she is among the nominees for women’s 15s breakthrough player of the year. 21-year-old King is in with a good shout of scooping that honour.
“I was shocked to be nominated,” says the Wicklow woman.
“I couldn’t believe it when I got the letter. I thought it was a joke and they got the wrong person.”
But few others were surprised given the impact King made in her first four Tests for Ireland in September and October.
Incredibly, her debut against Australia was just the fourth senior game of 15s rugby King had ever played. She came through with Naas RFC and featured for the Leinster and Ireland U18s but had focused solely on 7s rugby in the three years after that.
So she benefitted from joining an Ireland 15s set-up that had been improving under head coach Scott Bemand, with well-regarded assistants like defence coach Hugh Hogan, kicking coach Gareth Steenson, and forwards coach Alex Codling joining this year.
King had to lean on Codling’s expertise most of all.
“I was awful at the start, I couldn’t wrap my head around the lineouts but Codders is brilliant,” she says.
“He explained it all to me, we’d sit down every day and we’d go through them. That was the biggest struggle.”
Bemand encouraged King to back her instincts, giving her the freedom to play what she saw at the kind of speed that is the norm in 7s. Witness King’s quick-tap try against New Zealand.
“That was literally from 7s because you want to play quick. I wasn’t even really thinking, my intuition just came in.
“There’s not as much space on the pitch but all the girls have been taking the piss out of me that I’ve scored more tries in the WXV tournament than all year in the 7s.”
King was one of a few 7s internationals who switched across after the Olympics, with the likes of Amee-Leigh Murphy Crowe, Stacey Flood, Eve Higgins, Emily Lane, and Vicky Elmes Kinlan also adding speed of foot and thought.
The 7s internationals were thrilled to discover a 15s camp that was happy and optimistic. The last few years had been bleak for Irish women’s rugby but this squad play with smiles on their faces.
King says the work done by Seán Ryan, Ireland’s head of leadership and culture, has been crucial in this regard.
The squad’s theme is the ‘Green Wave,’ a term used to describe the most powerful, unbroken waves in the ocean. Ireland have made it their driving force.
“We talk about it a lot,” says King. “It’s the strongest wave in the ocean, we talk about those waves off the coast of Galway and things like that. Our team, our families, everyone who has touched the programme, past players, current players, everyone who influences our lives, they’re all part of our Green Wave. Nothing can get past us.
“Coming into the New Zealand game, we had a big focus on ‘belief versus awe.’ Playing the Black Ferns is such a big occasion, seeing the haka, and it was just about our Green Wave overcoming that, we shouldn’t be scared of them.
“It was a big challenge, but we knew that together we could beat them. We all believed.”
King is back on 7s duty now. She will fly out from Monaco to Dubai on Monday ahead of the opening leg of the SVNS Series season but the plan is for her to return to the 15s set-up for the Six Nations in March.
There’s also the small matter of the 15s World Cup kicking off in August, which King hopes to be part of.
For now, she’s excited to get rolling in 7s again, having thoroughly enjoyed her experience at the Olympics even if Ireland didn’t earn the medal they had targeted. King started all of Ireland’s games as they finished eighth overall.
“It was the most amazing thing playing in the Stade de France in front of all those people, words can’t really describe the feeling,” she says.
Her remarkable lift on team-mate Emily Lane at a restart during the game against Australia went viral on social media as King’s show of strength and support gained huge traction online. By now, the clip has been viewed well over 60 million times.
“It was kind of a whirlwind coming off the pitch,” says King. “In my head, it didn’t look like that. Me and Emily practice the pods all the time and I just threw her up and knew I had to get her down.
“But after the game, her family were all like, ‘Thank you so much, you saved her’ and I didn’t know what they meant. Then the video came out.
“It was insane. I was getting emails from news people in Brazil and stuff, it was crazy. It was just mad. People were in awe of it even though we practice it all the time, maybe not to that extent!”
King loved life in the Olympic village, where she and a few team-mates got competitive about swapping the national pins that every athlete gets. She enjoyed the random conversations with athletes from different sports and different nations.
While King made waves with her lift on Lane, her fellow 7s player, Ilona Maher from the US, became a genuine global star thanks to her big social media presence.
“She’s definitely doing God’s work for us and everyone’s talking about her, which is so good for the sport,” said King.
“Going into the World Cup next year, it will just get bigger and bigger.”
Having only turned 21 in October, King is delighting in all of these new experiences as they come but her ambition for the future has only grown.
She’s already thinking of the LA Olympics in 2028, while the 15s World Cup is on the horizon, and the SVNS Series is just around the corner.
But first, the World Rugby Awards in Monaco tomorrow where King will find out if her ascendency is recognised with a big prize.
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Breakthrough Erin King Ireland 15s Ireland 7s world rugby WXV