Hannah Botterman and Maud Muir dealt a powerful blow to England's Grand Slam bid. Photo: Ryan Hiscott/Getty Images
England's dominance in this year's Women's Six Nations was built on an incisive, free-flowing attack, but much of their success came from a dynamic double action.
Hannah Botterman and Maud Muir were outstanding players in a high-quality Red Roses team, smashing defenses with their strikes and embodying a peerless forward group that wore down their opponents.
This casual pairing is also popular. in the Red Roses camp and have interests outside of rugby to keep them occupied ahead of Saturday's Grand Slam decider. Muir is an avid newsreeler. She enjoys documenting her international journey with her beloved GoPro, a small camera that captures video more compactly than a smartphone.
Meanwhile, Botterman has taken her extracurricular activities to the next level. The tough-as-nails prop has started crocheting and even belongs to the unofficial Red Roses crochet club.
“I have a crochet book that's all about food, so I'm going to make food stuff,” she reveals. “Currently I made avocado toast and eggs Benedict. I recently baked a cupcake, but I still need to put chocolate chips in it.
Avocado toast is part of Botterman's growing portfolio < p>“Tatiana Heard started sewing clothes. It all started with Abby Doe. I ended up joining because I wanted to learn and the next thing I knew I was spending over £200 on crochet equipment. I don't have the right amount of yarn. I don't make time for this. Sometimes I'll practice and think, “I can't wait to get into bed and start crocheting!”
This weekend, however, the focus will be on the fight for a sixth Six Nations crown against France in Bordeaux. Two years ago in this match, the duo sat on the bench in Bayonne, where England overtook France amid whistles. They were essentially understudies to Vicky Cornborough and Sarah Byrne and were still learning how to beat teams by dominating set pieces.
But Cornborough's departure, coupled with Byrne's late-season knee injury, allowed Botterman and Muir to take over with aplomb. central place. Even though the pair have adopted a new game plan, they insist the Red Roses' superpower – the driving hammer – is still bubbling beneath the surface.
“Really, if we hit the corner, we’ll tear it apart,” Botterman, the Bristol goon, told Telegraph Sport. Muir nods and aptly sums it up: “It was more of a quarterback championship.”
2️⃣ out of 2️⃣ at @Womens6Nations for our own @Hanbotts 😎pic .twitter.com/K36htfwHZ9
— Bristol Bears Women 🐻 (@BristolBearsW) March 31, 2024 < p>There is the slightest suggestion that the pair's significant contribution to the Red Roses' campaign – they started three of England's four games together – has faded amid the highlights with eye-catching scores created by England's blistering attack. “I feel like people think it’s okay for us to get scrimmage penalties,” Botterman said. “This has come to be expected of us. But when we get them, it's not by accident or because other teams are crap. It's because we did a really good job and sometimes I feel like the recognition doesn't necessarily come to us.”
Scramble France have shown excellent results in the championship so far, but Botteman and Muir, who retained their starting places for the battle with Bordeaux, feel confident. The pair worked with Nathan Catt, the RFU's scrum coach, who was brought in to help the team throughout the campaign, marking the first radical development for the team.
“We didn’t have a scrum coach before,” Botterman says. “We were never really taught properly. So we probably weren't as ruthless as we would have liked. This morning we looked at the statistics: France has a 100 percent success rate in bouts, and we have a 90 percent success rate. But in scrimmages we earned six more penalties than them.”
Specialist coaches have become almost a given in men's rugby, but in women's rugby – even at Test level – they are not yet a regular feature. It's a problem that drives Botterman crazy. “If you look at the men's game, men's teams can have more than 10 coaches. We typically have a forwards coach and a defense coach,” she says.
Both have Katt’s praises, though. “He was great,” Muir says. “We probably had some trouble figuring out what each of us needed to do individually. Everyone will have their own work to do, but then it's about how we put it together. I feel like we're in a good place now. I feel like that will be a very important aspect of Saturday's game.”
Flying Abbey Dow is briefly delayed but Wales can't stop Maud Muir from scoring the first try of the match.#BBCRugby #SixNations pic.twitter.com/Hs1WGY4CZh
— BBC Sport (@BBCSport) March 30, 2024
In At 24, Botterman is just four short of a Test half-century, while 22-year-old Muir is already 29. It's scary to think that the pair still have their best years ahead of them, and a sign that England's prop department is in poor shape. “We have potential for growth in the future,” says Muir, a Gloucester and Hartpury front-row player. “We are actually at the beginning of our career, although we have been in the team for quite some time. The fact that we are getting off to a consistent start is encouraging.”
As the pair are led away for further review of the scrum, Muir takes the opportunity to quote the old rugby adage: “Forwards win games, backs.” decide how many points.” For England's title-contending team, this could hardly ring truer.
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