THE JOURNEY TO THE GAMES
I WAS so close to being an Olympian in Tokyo and it was such a difficult decision to step away from sevens when I did. It remained an itch I needed to scratch. With the new England XVs coaching staff coming in, with John Mitchell as head coach, I thought if I’m going to ask about it then now is the time. I was prepared for the worst, so I didn’t get my hopes too high. And then I just was on a call with Mitch and told him how much it would mean to me to go to an Olympics. And he kind of just said, “Yeah, why not?” To have that just lifted so much weight off my shoulders, because I thought it was going to be a really difficult conversation to have. I thought it was going to be back and forth, but he said he was never going to stand in the way of anyone wanting to follow their dreams.
When I went back into the set-up with Meg Jones, the girls welcomed us with open arms. It
