Firwood Waterloo Ladies – Gloucester-Hartpury Women

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Three changes for Gloucester-Hartpury for trip to Firwood Waterloo Ladies

Head Coach Susie Appleby makes three changes to the Gloucester-Hartpury Womens starting line-up for Saturday’s Tyrrells Premier 15s fixture away at Firwood Waterloo Ladies.

The three changes are all in the pack. Ellie Gilbert returns at hooker in place of the injured Connie Powell, while there are two changes in the back row as Tabs Copson returns from injury to make her first appearance of the season at openside and Sian Williams comes in at number eight.

Meanwhile, amongst the replacements, Welsh international, Dyddgu Hywel, who joined the club this week, is named in the squad for the first time.

Gloucester-Hartpury’s last outing, a fortnight ago at home to Loughborough Lightning, ended in a painful 40-41 defeat as the visitors were awarded a penalty try with the last play of the game.

Appleby says that her team are looking forward to getting back into match action but aware that it will be a tough challenge that awaits them.

“We are looking forward to getting back on the field after a week’s break. We are playing some really good rugby, and scoring excellent tries, but our accuracy at key moments in games is letting us down. We need to perform for 80 minutes to get results in this league.

“The games are tough every week, Waterloo will be no exception. They have some excellent players and do simple things really well, and will be particularly buoyed playing in front of their home crowd.

“It has been an exciting two weeks for us with Storage King coming on board as our main shirt sponsor, and we are grateful to them and keen to put in a good performance to take us into our home game against Worcester next week.”

Gloucester-Hartpury Women:

15. Mary Ann Gittings; 14. Ellie Underwood, 13. Millie Wood, 12. Tatyana Heard, 11. Kelly Smith; 10. Ceri Large (vice-captain), 9. Bianca Blackburn; 1. Sasha Acheson, 2. Ellie Gilbert, 3. Katie Dougan; 4. Courtney Gill, 5. Zoe Aldcroft (capt); 6. Taz Bricknell, 7. Tabs Copson, 8. Sian Williams

Replacements:

16. Ranni Samuda, 17. Anabelle Whitecross, 18. Iona Antwis, 19. Elle Febry, 20. Meg Goddard, 21. Shauna Bennett, 22. Dyddgu Hywel