eagles.rugby — The USA Women’s Sevens Eagles are set to travel to Australia for a comprehensive warm-up match and training tour in preparation for the upcoming season. [lead photo: Alex Ho @hoiho_photo]
The tour will feature competitive matches against top-tier opponents, opposed training, and valuable team-building opportunities. Head coach Emilie Bydwell and staff will travel with a full squad roster of 18 athletes including six new faces to the set-up for the upcoming season.
The team will depart on October 11 and arrive in Brisbane before making its way to Toowoomba, Queensland. The main competitive portion of the tour will take place in Toowoomba Sports Ground at the Global Rugby Series on October 17-18, where the Eagles will face off against the New Zealand and Australian national teams.
Following the matches, the squad will move to the Gold Coast for a dedicated block of training and team bonding. This period will focus on refining foundational elements and solidify cohesion ahead of the upcoming season.
View this post on Instagram
For the final leg of the tour, the team will travel to Sydney for a combined training block with the Australian National Team before their departure home on October 25. This unique opportunity will allow both teams to sharpen their skills and learn from one another in opposed head-to-head training sessions.
“This warm-up tour is an invaluable part of our preparation,” said head coach Emilie Bydwell. “The first year of the quad focused on building a foundation — identifying key players to develop, figuring out our current player profile, assessing how the game has changed and shifted after Paris, and determining the shape of the game we are going to play going forward.
“Coming off the back of the summer, where we worked hard to select this player group for this season, we can now focus on defining a game model that will be well suited to these players and allow them to play a style that maximizes their strengths.
“This tour gives us the opportunity to play the best teams in the world – in the style of play we want, and beta test some of the ideas we’ve been cultivating in the lab that is Chula Vista. For us to be able to do that ahead of the season against Australia and New Zealand which are fantastic teams is extremely useful. Their players are some of the highest calibre and coaches are the best in the world. This opportunity to test ourselves now, helps us in our pursuit of “raising our frame” this year and solidifies how we want to play and build into the team we want to be.”
Tournament matches will not be streamed by the local organizers but updates will be posted on USA Rugby social channels.