Marlie Packer enjoying new regime as she closes on Test century

Marlie Packer has plenty of reason to be excited as she stands on the start line of another Women’s Six Nations campaign.

It is almost impossible to think of a superlative that does the England captain’s 2023 justice. In her first year as permanent Red Roses skipper, Packer led the team to a Six Nations Grand Slam, the inaugural WXV 1 title and was crowned World Rugby Women’s 15s Player of the Year.

Under Packer’s leadership England won 10 Test matches out of 10 last year and 2024 has the potential to be just as special for the decorated Saracens flanker.

Barring injury, and Packer is confident she has overcome the calf issue suffered in club action recently, she will become only the seventh Englishwoman to become a Test centurion when she leads the Red Roses out in Parma on 24 March.

“I’m super excited, but I’m more excited about kicking off the tournament. As you saw with the Red Roses at WXV last year, we’ve changed the way we’re playing. We’re now evolving that. We’ve enjoyed the first half of the PWR season and we can’t wait to kick things off,” Packer said.

“With regards to my 100th cap, I just want to get out there and play. We’ve got the likes of Abbie Ward, Emily Scarratt, Zoe Harrison coming back. We haven’t seen that calibre of players since the World Cup final.

“I’m more excited to see them come back than to get my 100th cap this coming month.”

Speaking to Packer at the Women’s Six Nations launch in London this week, it is clear how much she is enjoying working with new England head coach, John Mitchell.

Although Mitchell described himself as England’s “invisible man” last year on Wednesday, his influence on the Red Roses was clear in their triumphant WXV 1 campaign in New Zealand and he has made no secret of his desire to evolve the team’s style of play.

For some people, especially those entering their mid-30s who have enjoyed incredible success playing a certain way, change might not seem overly enticing. But Packer has been energised by the new approach.

“I get on with Mitch [Mitchell] really well,” she said. “Sometimes I really get him and I feel like we’re on the same wavelength and I’m like, ‘Yeah, I know’. And then the next day we have a conversation and I’m like, ‘Oh, I need to work on that there’.

“He’s great. He poses questions, he makes you see the game differently to what I’ve seen before, he asks why we’re doing this and that and what other options we can have.

“He’s a really nice guy and he’s been really refreshing. Going into WXV, the direction in how we wanted to play was still coming from Mitch, even though Deacs [Louis Deacon] was still in on everything. He’s put the full stop at the end of things.

“Sometimes we’d ask questions to coaches, and it would be quite open, but he has the last word, like ‘This is how I want things done, guys’.”

Packer added: “Different coaches set different challenges in what they want from you.

“I might not be the quickest in the bunch but put me in a 50-50 situation and I’m going to win the ball. That’s my mindset – it’s nobody else’s mindset. You have to have the mindset that you always want to win or do better.”

It is that drive that shut down any suggestion that Packer might sit out England’s trip to Parma next weekend to celebrate her 100th appearance closer to home, in Bristol.

More than 15,000 tickets have already been sold for the match against Wales at Ashton Gate on 30 March and Packer revealed on Wednesday that Mitchell had checked in to see what she wanted to do. His captain’s competitive spirit held firm, however.

“The conversation did happen with Mitch, which was quite nice,” Packer explained. “I didn’t think there’d be an open conversation about it.

“For me it’s about the rose, the shirt and leaving it in a better place because it might be the last time you wear it.

“It’s a privilege to be selected for a Test. So, for him to ask me, ‘What are you thinking? How are you feeling?’ I said, ‘No, I want to start the Six Nations as Red Roses captain and get my 100th cap then and I want to finish the Six Nations as Red Roses captain’.

“I won’t let up my shirt for anyone else.”

Packer’s stance is also an indication of just how competitive the Red Roses squad is as they attempt to win a sixth successive Six Nations championship.

Mitchell has described the team’s potential as “huge” and with competition from the likes of Sadia Kabeya, Zoe Aldcroft, Alex Matthews and the uncapped Maddie Feaunati, Packer knows she cannot rest on her laurels.

“I just need to keep doing me. I don’t need to be anyone else,” she said. “I’ve never been anyone else in my career, I just need to keep driving myself and pushing myself.

“They’re all incredible players who bring different attributes to the game. But I know I bring something different and I can call on those players – or myself – to put in a performance.

“I say this now, not one player will play probably every 80 minutes of this Six Nations, because of the physicality in the women’s game there now is and the tempo we want to play at.

“We’re building to something bigger – it is about the Six Nations and winning it – but we’re also building to the 2025 World Cup. We have new names in this squad that are really exciting – they’re going to get their opportunity, while others won’t.”