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Leanne Infante enjoys winning finale with Saracens
By Martyn Thomas
Leanne Infante admitted feeling “a lot of emotion” as she bowed out of elite rugby, helping Saracens maintain their perfect start to the Premiership Women’s Rugby season in the process.
Former England scrum-half Infante announced last Friday that Sunday’s encounter with Gloucester-Hartpury at StoneX Stadium would be her final act at the top level.
Having led out her team-mates ahead of what was also her 100th appearance for Saracens, she played 65 minutes as the hosts beat the back-to-back champions 49-38 to record their fourth successive win of the season.
It brought to an end a successful career in which Infante won 57 England caps, played at two Women’s Rugby World Cups and represented Harlequins, Bristol Bears and Richmond as well as Saracens.
Asked to put her final match into words, Infante told TNT Sports: "A lot of emotion, I’ve got a lot of people here supporting me and more back home.
“Thank you to everyone that’s come out, Saracens have made it unbelievably special this week so I cannot thank everyone who’s made it happen and made it so special.”
Player of the Match Zoe Harrison kicked 14 points for Saracens and dedicated the win to her former England colleague.
Harrison said: “I’m so glad we could get the win for her. She’s an incredible girl and an incredible player. It will be very hard to see her go.”
Infante is stepping away from playing in order to focus on her career in finance but insisted that she will “definitely stay in the game” in some capacity.
Her decision to hang up her boots means that her last involvement with England will be the Women’s RWC 2021 final defeat to New Zealand in Auckland two years ago.
Speaking exclusively to BBC Radio 5 Live on Friday, the scrum-half revealed the current coaching set-up had “made it pretty clear I'm not part of their future plans”.
"The reality is professional sport is cruel, there's not many people who get to retire on their own terms internationally," she added.
"It hurt for a while and there were peaks and troughs between that time period.
"I thought I was over it and then I'd take a backward step, but that's all probably far in the past now and I can talk about it openly and non-emotionally."
Victory keeps Saracens top of the PWR table following four rounds, two points clear of second-placed Exeter Chiefs.
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Latest Comments
I agree it needs looked it. Most clubs and nations are now identifying talent long before they are capped and directly influencing what country they represent. Not all teams obviously but it's certainly a trend.
It used to be that an electric 22 years old winger would announce himself for the ABs by scoring on debut in the July tests. Announce themselves on the big stage playing for their country. Nowadays if they’re scouted at 14 or 15 and developed elsewhere, you've no idea where they may end up.
Most young talent I see nowadays I have to Google them to get an idea of what international Jersey they might even wear.
The only thing that keeps the discussion on Ice is probably the boks. They don't go overseas for talent and their RWC record speaks for itself. On the flipside most of their talent plays club rugby outside of SA which is another can of worms.
Go to commentsAgreed. Just to add to that the hitherto leaky Crisaders defence was resolute and enabled them to establish an amazing 31 to zip lead at the 60 minute mark. A couple of late lapses allowed the dangerous Drua attack to reduce the final margin somewhat but the game was virtually won by then. Only criticism would be the number of handling mistakes made but the steamy playing conditions probably contributed to that. Not many teams come away from Suva with such a comfortable margin. Pity they were unable to show the same fortitude against Moana.
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