The Irish Rugby Football Union's head of women's strategy, Lynne Cantwell, has described the upcoming WXV Global Series as a 'mini-World Cup every year, but on home soil'. The tournament, which replaces the previous WXV competition, will feature the top 12 teams globally, including Ireland, England, Scotland, Wales, France, Italy, Japan, South Africa, and the United States.
Matches will be played during the autumn break, serving as preparation for the 2029 World Cup in Australia. Teams will play between nine and 16 Tests annually. Cantwell highlighted the significance: "Ireland play USA and Japan, and the actual locations are nearly ready to be published before the end of the Six Nations. This will be brilliant."
She added: "You are going to have a mini-World Cup every year but this will be on home soil. From an Irish rugby point of view, we will have five or six international home games every year, which has never happened before. That is really massive."
Ireland are currently competing in the Women's Six Nations, having lost two of their opening three fixtures. However, Cantwell praised the team's performance in the 26-7 loss to France: "The first half against France, particularly from a pack point of view, was sublime. I have never seen anything like it from an Ireland point of view."
Cantwell, a former Ireland captain with 86 caps and a 2013 Grand Slam winner, now focuses on making the women's game financially sustainable. "One of the big roles is how do we commercialise the game and go on a journey to generate revenue and put it back into pathways and grassroots. At the moment, the women's game largely relies on the men's game to fund it."