Red Roses star ready to bloom in the final
By Mark Stevens
24/6/23
Claudia MacDonald has spoken of her excitement ahead of today's Allianz Premier 15s final between Gloucester-Hartpury and Exeter Chiefs at Queensholm (3:30pm).
The England international is one of two changes Susie Appleby has made to her Chiefs starting line-up from that which defeated defending champions Saracens at Sandy Park a fornight ago.
MacDonald comes in on the wing for Katie Buchanan, whilst former Wasps team-mate Edel McMahon is added to the back-row at the expense of Abbie Fleming.
The inclusion of the duo, however, is huge for the Devonians, who will be looking to go one step further than last season and lift a first-ever women's league title.
For MacDonald, it would cap what has been a wonderful season for the 27-year-old, who was part of the England side that just missed out on World Cup glory back in November.
Since then, she has settled well to life in the Westcountry, scoring ten tries in 11 appearances to date.
"The amount of game time I've had, the consistency of playing with Chiefs has just been brilliant," she said. "A lot of the girls were here last year, so they've experienced that final last year."
"For me it was something that I worked for for a long time at Wasps and we never quite got there, so there's certainly quite a lot of nerves, but a lot of excitement too. It's a huge occasion for women's rugby and there's been a huge amount of momentum that's been built since that England game against France, so hopefully it'll be a good culmination to the season and hopefully we'll come out on top."
As well as playing in that record women's crowd of 58,498 at Twickenham as England secured the Six Nations against France in April, MacDonald also featured as a replacement in the loss to New Zealand in the World Cup final in the autumn.
But in that time there has been a significant change as MacDonald has moved from scrum-half to winger since joining Exeter - something she has relished.
"I love the open spaces. As a nine I'm constantly trying to look for two-on-ones and to run with the ball, which isn't ideal for a scrum-half, you want them distributing and getting the ball to other people," she said. "That played quite well into me playing on the wing, and I've just absolutely loved it to be honest. I really love playing out in the wide channels and I've just stuck there.
"In the World Cup prep (then England head coach) Simon Middleton quite liked what I was doing out there and I played quite a lot of the World Cup out there, and when I came to Chiefs Susie (Appleby, Exeter head coach) was like 'it'll be easier for you to learn our system and our processes starting on the wing and then over time we can move you over to scrum-half once you've really mastered the system'.
"But the second bit just never really happened. I played one game at scrum-half, against Wasps ironically, and Poppy (Leitch, Exeter co-captain) described me as 'she was alright, it's like playing with a wing at scrum-half' - I was like 'Poppy, you know I actually played in a World Cup final at scrum-half'."
MacDonald was part of the England side that narrowly lost to hosts new Zealand in the World Cup final last year
MacDonald became the first front-line England player to move to Exeter since the club was formed, joining a host of other internationals from countries including the United States, Canada and Ireland.
And her experience and talent has certainly made an impact on the side.
"What Claud has brought us on the wing is genuine match-winning potential," Exeter coach Steve Salvin said. "You look at the number of line breaks she's made, look at the number of defenders she's beaten, you look at the raw pace that she had, but also the ability to make good decisions under pressure, she's a very special talent.
"She's incredibly driven, she works incredibly hard and she probably sets the tone for a number of people in the squad to follow that lead, and that's only going to benefit the younger players who are learning that work ethic element of their development.
"From the outside she might not be perceived as one of our leaders or our captains as such, but certainly in terms of the way she interacts in the background, on the training field, she would absolutely be a leader in that regard, so she's brought a real big strand of leadership as well.
"The other thing is she's just brought real quality. She's a very, very, very good player and we're a better team when she's on the field."