Breen: We Want Those Good Glimpses Over 80 Minutes

2024 was a brilliant year for Breen as she returned from an ACL injury, helping Ireland to qualify for the Rugby World Cup with a third place finish in the Guinness Women’s Six Nations, and then stepped up as captain for their WXV1 clashes with Canada and the USA.

The strong-running centre has bounced into 2025 on the back of leading the Clovers team to their first ever win over the Wolfhounds, a result which kickstarted a run of five straight victories for Denis Fogarty’s youthful squad.

She missed out on playing in last season’s Celtic Challenge, only returning from her long injury lay-off against Italy at the end of March, so getting a run of games under her belt with the Clovers is ideal preparation for the upcoming Six Nations.

She has captained the Clovers for five of their fixtures so far, pairing up with either Ellen Boylan or Anna McGann in the centre. They continued on the winning trail against Glasgow Warriors last Sunday, winning 41-19 in Cork despite letting their performance levels dip at times.

Giving her reaction afterwards at Virgin Media Park, Breen said: “I’m delighted (with the win), but it was a bit of a frustrating team performance at times.

“We’re a little bit disappointed despite the result because we don’t think we put our best foot forward. Yeah, we showed good glimpses, but we really want to have those good glimpses over 80 minutes as much as possible.

“We’re a bit frustrated, but at the end of the day, a bonus point win is brilliant. We have to take that for what it is as well, so we’ve got to celebrate that too.”

Five first-half tries set the Clovers on their way, including a terrific eighth-minute effort involving Breen and Amee-Leigh Costigan, who have both included in Scott Bemand’s 40-player Ireland training squad that will come together next Monday.

Picking up a loose ball just past the halfway line, Breen spun and sliced through the heart of the Glasgow defence before threading through a perfectly-timed and weighted cross-field kick out to the right where Costigan collected the bouncing ball to score.

The Skibbereen native was modest as ever when looking back on her assist, saying afterwards: “Leigh is always out there! You always know she’s going to be expecting it.

“Yeah, I could kind of see her in my peripheral (vision), and I saw the space and I just went for it. I knew in a one-on-one race, there’s nobody going to beat her. Luckily she got on the end of it.”

Niamh Briggs, the Ireland Under-20 Women’s head coach and National Women’s Talent coach at Munster, selected Breen as the player-of-the-match last weekend, acknowledging that her ‘work-rate on both sides of the ball was class’.

The 25-year-old has unsurprisingly been one of the Clovers’ leading ball carriers in the tournament, making an average of 7.6 metres per carry. In addition, her right boot has come in handy with almost 300 metres gained from 14 kicks out of hand.

Briggs felt the Blackrock College and Munster star led her team ‘exceptionally well’ and that her try involvements were also ‘excellent’. She had a tackle-breaking run in the lead up to the first of Deirbhile Nic a Bháird’s two tries on the day.

All that points to a player coming into national camp in strong form, and Breen will be determined to lead from the front again when the Six Nations comes around next month. She is the second most-capped back (25 caps) in the Ireland group, just behind the returning Béibhinn Parsons (26).

Before that, the Clovers will still hope to push the table-topping Wolfhounds hard in the Celtic Challenge run-in. There are three rounds still remaining, and two points currently separate the two Irish teams at the summit.

News came through earlier this week that the Clovers’ round 5 match away to Glasgow, which was postponed due to Storm Éowyn, cannot be rescheduled and has been recorded as a 0-0 draw with both sides awarded two league points.

A statement confirmed: “Upon review of the available reserve weekends and current fixture schedule, the Celtic Challenge organising committee concluded there was insufficient space to rearrange the game.”

All that Breen and her team-mates can focus on now is trying to erase that two-point gap in their final three outings, beginning with Saturday week’s trip to Llanelli to play second-from-bottom Brython Thunder.

The Wolfhounds, last year’s Celtic Challenge winners, visit Edinburgh before face third-placed Gwalia Lightining away, as do the Clovers the following week, so it is still all to play for.

Reflecting on the Glasgow game and what they took out of it, Breen added: “We showed some great glimpses in attack. Once we got go-forward ball, once we got into the right parts of the pitch, it was tough to stop us and we showed great glimpses there once we were in space.

We’ve some world-class backs so when we can get the ball in their hands and put them into space, they’re going to be difficult to stop.

“Our pack showed great glimpses as well. They’re the ones that got us on the front foot to create those tries. Probably a few things to look at in defence and once we lose momentum.

“But once we get front-foot ball and get on the front foot, it’s difficult to stop us. There’s positives to look from there too.”