Sawt Falasteen - Woodman-Wickliffe lines up 'one last ride' for Black Ferns at World Cup

The 34-year-old wing from Kawakawa in the Northland region of New Zealand has won just about everything going -- two World Cups with the XVs and in Paris last year she collected a second Olympic Sevens title.

"I was lucky enough to have my mum, my dad, my wife and my daughter there and just to look up into the crowd and see them there was amazing," she tells AFP as the words tumble out at a thousand miles an hour.

The Sevens game was perfect for the pocket rocket -- she is just 1.70m tall and weighs in at 70kg -- who set her sights when she was a child on being the Jonah Lomu of the woman's game.

Give her half a metre and she can blast her way into open field, blowing away any half-hearted tackles with a neat sidestep or a vigorous full-face hand off. She has power, strength and pace from a standing start.

She retired from Sevens after the Olympics and opened the door on a return to XVs.

"This World Cup was never on my agenda, I never really planned to go to it.

"But I thought I'm still enjoying XVs, why not give this a crack. If I don't make it fine, it's cool. But if I do make it, then it will be one last ride."

- Magnificent seven -

Her comeback was a thrilling 27-27 draw with Canada in May. She failed to get on the scoresheet but compensated in style a week later when she ran in seven tries in a 79-14 thrashing of the USA.

Three of those seven saw her crashing through the despairing defence of Ilona Maher, whose social media presence has arguably done more to promote the women's game than anything that has happened on the field.

"What Ilona has done to put not just her own name out there but women's rugby and women's sport on such a global aspect has been amazing and we all need to be a part of that," says Woodman-Wickliffe.

"Having someone from America with that American market who is very confident, loves rugby, loves supporting women's bodies, someone as vocal as that is amazing for us.

"We need to capitalise and follow her as much as we can."

Those magnificent seven tries took her past Vanessa Cootes' record of 43 for the Black Ferns, a tally she bumped up on her 34th birthday with three more in a 37-12 win over Australia. She now has a record 48 tries in her 28 Tests.

The challenge now for Woodman-Wickliffe in the tournament, which gets underway in England on August 22, is not just to make it three World Cup victories on the bounce but to nudge her sport yet another rung up the ladder of public awareness.

"The game has changed and that is because of the support that has come into women's rugby from across the whole world," she says.

"It's come a long way to be able to do rugby all year round, train, eat and sleep rugby, that's amazing.

"But to allow girls the comfort and ability just to focus on being a rugby player as a whole -- physically, emotionally, family-wise, socially -- there definitely needs to be an increase in that."

She remains confident that just as she benefitted from the work of predecessors such as Cootes, times will be even better for the next generation of players who follow in her own imposing wake.

"There's more growth to come. Since 2016 there's been a 33 percent increase in girls playing rugby (in New Zealand).

"Most of it has been in junior rugby and we would love to see girls stay in it after high school into woman's grade.

"I have a daughter who's 12. She wants to be a Black Fern and I'm hoping that in five to six years time she will experience even more than I have. I am hoping it gets better."

V.AbuAwwad--SF-PST