This season sees some exciting new promotions. Banbridge, a club with a strong women and girls’ programme, has earned promotion to the Premiership. Meanwhile, Ballymena, Clogher Valley, and Virginia, all relatively new senior women's setups, have made impressive progress and have been promoted to Championship A. Monaghan, a new team to Championship B, has also been added to the mix, with Ulster Senior Women’s player, Kelly McCormill joining their coaching team as a backs coach.
As the season begins, we caught up with some of the players to hear their thoughts on the upcoming campaign.
Banbridge's Jemma Farrell expressed her excitement about the team's promotion to the Premiership.
"We've had a really good preseason, and the girls are really excited about getting stuck in to the tougher competition. It's a great testament and advert for women's rugby within the club and within Ulster.
“I think it is really special that we are now competing at the top of our game in Ulster, getting to do that alongside girls I’ve grown up with in the top division in Ulster is amazing.
“I think it is incredible for our pathway girls right from U10s, seeing the progression in women’s rugby within the club and within Ulster. It’s a great testament and advert for it. It’s a privilege, obviously it comes with that pressure to perform well, but we are ready for the challenge."
Ballymena's Kathryn McKeown highlighted the team's rapid progress, being promoted to Championship A in only their third season.
"This is such a big step for Ballymena, as this is only our third year playing in the league. We've really hit preseason hard this year, developing a gym programme for the team to help us step up to this next level of rugby.
“Starting the season with a home game is great, you feel that bit more comfortable with a home crowd and running out on your home pitch. We are really looking forward to kicking off."
Queens' Rebecca Mann is optimistic about her team's chances against powerhouse Enniskillen.
"Kicking off the season with Enniskillen, we are feeling excited. We’ve had really good numbers at training, and the girls are looking good. We had a friendly against Blackrock a couple of weeks ago, and had a great game, the girls really put a shift in. If we can do that again this weekend, it will be a very exciting game.”
This fixture should be an exciting one, as Queens and Enniskillen have been drawn to play each other in the first round of the Women’s Junior Cup. Rebecca remarked,
“In terms of getting them in the draw for the Junior Cup, it will be good to see how Enniskillen are playing this early on in the season. Obviously there is a bit of nerves taking on the reigning champs, but I think the team will really relish the opportunity. We are really chomping at the bit this season, we want to win and I know we can win, so we are just hoping to put that into play. As long as we enjoy our rugby, we will win our rugby.
“The development of women’s rugby at Queen’s has been remarkable. We have an excellent coaching set up, the likes of Grace Davitt and Ollie Millar, and Colm Finnegan has just joined us from Cooke. They are fantastic, they are looking at us all individually and really helping us strengthen our skills. The environment at Queen’s is really lovely, I couldn’t ask for a better team to play for."
Clogher Valley's Jessica Carruth is excited about the challenge of Championship A.
"We’re very excited to be newly promoted this season and facing City of Derry this weekend. It gives us great confidence being newly promoted, and we are looking forward to this new challenge of a higher level of rugby. We want to build upon what we achieved last season, and we are looking forward to seeing how we come up against this new league of teams.
“We have an amazing amount of girls coming out for training week in week out, as well as amazing coaches. At training, all the team puts in tremendous effort and we all have such a focus on the goal this season. To be promoted to Championship A in our third year is such a testament to the club, all the girls, the coaches and everyone that turns out to support us. It shows the amount of effort we put into matches, the effort our coaches put in and the support that we have from everyone at the club."
Enniskillen's Amanda Farrell is eager to start the season against big rival Queen’s.
"We are very excited to start off our season. Queens will be a very big match for us this weekend as they are great competitors, but we are really relishing the challenge. Having that opportunity to play them before the Junior Cup will give us an insight into what type of rugby they play and how we can face them.
“It’s obviously nice to be the reigning champions of the Junior Cup, and the team worked so hard to win last year, we really want to replicate that this season. It’s nice to have something to work towards and to know you have a standard to uphold.
“I’ve played for Enniskillen since U14, it is where I started rugby and I am so honoured to now be on our Senior Women’s team, it really highlights that the Enniskillen club is like family and I wouldn’t want to play anywhere else."
In the Energia All-Ireland League, Cooke will play their first game away to Suttonians.
As the season unfolds, we can expect plenty of exciting matches and fierce competition across all divisions.