“We’re bigger and better than ever”: Laflin lauds Worcester Warriors’ wonderous start
Worcester Warriors Women captain Vicky Laflin has assured her side are here to stay after an assertive 14-28 opening weekend victory away against Harlequins Women.
Laflin, who scored two scorching tries including a half-pitch effort in the second half, was full of praise for Worcester’s efforts in their first league match since May.
She said: “Yeh, I think it was really good. Obviously, we knew we wanted to turn up.
“We’ve been through a lot, and we just wanted to stay together as a team and I think that’s what we really did, and we really brough it to Quins.”
Worcester’s victory over the 2020/21 champions was particularly impressive given their place in the league was only fully secured earlier this month.
Worcester Warriors had been banned by the RFU after WRFC Trading Ltd was wound up in early October.
The RFU gave permission for Worcester, and fellow victim of financial trouble Wasps, to continue playing towards the end of October.
This allowed them to play in the Allianz Cup and confirmed their future until the end of the year, but their place in the Allianz Premier 15s for the entire season was only fully confirmed with the funding provided by Kempsey-based sports management business Cube International in November.
Laflin confirmed that the past is still in the player’s minds but that the situation has brought the squad together.
“We think about it, it’s always there. I think it just shows no matter what we’ve gone through, we’ve really grown as a team together”, she said.
“We all wanted to stay her for each other, and I think it’s been really positive for us. We’re here and we’re bigger and better than ever.
“But yeh, we’re moving on, focusing on the rugby, but I think it’s just something were always going to remember that we got through together. We’re here to perform and here to challenge teams now.”
The Worcester Warriors winger was also clear that this is just the start for her side.
She said: “There’s no limit to us. I think it’s just looking for those 80-minute games and making sure we’re challenging teams. I have faith in us, and we’re doing really well – good start”
Meanwhile Harlequins captain Emily Scott spoke well after a tough loss at home on the opening day, recognising the areas Quins have to work on and that there’s plenty of time to improve.
“Frustration is the number one [emotion]”, she said.
“We wanted to start better than that, we know we could do better than that. We’ve had a really good pre-season, we’ve been building for a while. It would have been good to go out and show what we can do, but we didn’t reach our full potential today”
“It was lots of unforced errors. I think we were our own worst enemies if I’m honest. We had opportunities, so we’ll go back and look at ourselves, there quite a lot there for us to dig into.
“Our set piece and our breakdown wasn’t good enough. But like I said in the huddle, they’re not big changes, they’re small fixes that we can go away and work on this week.
“But I think that’s the best bit about it, that we can go and improve on it now. You always learn more from a loss, and we certainly learned a lot today.”
