Kylemore Book Club: Trailblazers – Breaking Gender Boundaries

The third virtual event of To Hell or to Connacht: Stories of Irish Resilience featured current President of Connacht Rugby, Ann Heneghan as well as former US rugby player, sports media talent, motivational speaker, and business entrepreneur, Phaidra Knight. This event was moderated by Lisa Caulfield, Director of the Global Centre at Kylemore, and featured Eamonn Molloy (Coach Development Manager at Connacht Rugby) and Justin Hickey (Director of Rugby – Head Coach at Notre Dame). The goal of this session was to take a closer look at Women’s rugby in Connacht and the USA and discuss the ways in which the women’s game has grown, but also the ways in which the women’s side of the sport is still not where it should be. Featuring regional/national players, international players and coaches, and the first female president of Connacht Rugby, topics such as opportunity, inclusivity, and the road ahead were discussed.

Personal stories and background from both Heneghan and Knight helped to bring discussions surrounding the women’s game and topics such as recruitment, funding, and media presence to light. The background stories and experiences explained through the pre-recorded videos and the live session helped to shed a light on how female players, coaches, and administrators have found the sport and how they have worked hard to bring it to the forefront of the media so it gets the attention it deserves. 

Using pre-submitted questions and a flowing interview style, the hour consisted of questions asked by each of the moderators which were answered by Heneghan first and then Knight, whose experiences were quite different but still complimented each other and were interesting to hear and compare. 

The questions began with Ann talking about her life-long interest in rugby and her involvement with the Connacht side for years before she got the role of Vice President, and then President of the provincial team. For Ann, rugby was a part of her life for a long enough time that she felt comfortable and at ease taking on an administrative role within the club even if she was the only woman to do so. She later took some time out to start her own solicitor business and when she returned to Connacht Rugby, she chaired their disciplinary committee. She went on to talk about being offered the position of Vice President and then President of Connacht Rugby as the first woman to hold this position in all of Ireland and how much it meant that it was Connacht to offer her this position over another province. She also discussed how low visibility of women holding administrative roles within rugby meant fewer women thought they could go on to get the roles (“if you can’t see it, you can’t be it”); an idea that Knight touched on later with regards to numbers of female players in rugby both in Ireland and the USA. 

Next, Knight spoke about her experience finding rugby during her time at Law School and how the inclusivity of the team and the values that the game encapsulated drew her in initially. Knight spoke about the forecast that in the USA by 2025, 40 – 45% of the playing population of rugby will be women, showing that there is an upward positive trend (however, this number could slow slightly due to the pandemic). This trend, according to Knight, is partially forecasted because of the fact that more girls are starting to play from a younger age and are sticking with it. An increase in female participation means a boost in building the grassroots game and the high performance game, says Knight. One of the ways to help the growth in numbers is to turn to a more commercial spotlight on the sport and the women’s side in particular. Knight then went on to talk a bit about her own initiatives with using the sport as a vehicle for personal change for young women and the importance of visibility. Knight finished by talking about her clothing line, PSK Collective which recently launched and focuses on creating athletic clothes and casual wear made for women and all types of body shapes.  

This event concluded with a short breakout session for viewers to meet and further discuss the content with fellow book club participants.

Visit the event page for more.