Coaching Laid Bare with Lynne Cantwell

Bird and LJ talk to Lynne Cantwell, the first high performance manager for the women’s game in South Africa.

Lynne is Ireland’s most capped (86) female rugby player. She was appointed to the South African role in February 2021. She has been a member of Sport Ireland’s board since 2019. She is also a qualified physiotherapist.

Here are the questions posed to Lynne:

• Your degree was in Sport and Exercise Science along with a Masters in Physiotherapy. When and how did you realise that your real passion was driving high performance sport?
• This year you were appointed as South African rugby first HP manager for women’s rugby- how exciting is this role?
• You have a young family, husband and are uprooting and moving to SA was this a difficult decision?
• There are lots of exciting Autumn Internationals plus games against the Barbarians, Wales, Scotland. We saw Twitter post of squad celebrating announcement of fixture singing. Talk us through the culture, support and what it means to the players
• What does the current pathway look like?
• Let’s look forward to the World cup pool with England, France, and Fiji to deal with. What are your expectations?
• Ireland has not qualified for the World Cup in 2022 which is devastating for all involved. What needs to happen now?