Pushing the game: Growing the popularity of the 2025 Women’s Six Nations through collaboration and ever more broadcast coverage

The 2025 Women’s Six Nations kicked off on 22 March

Fresh from the 2025 Men’s Six Nations Championship which ended on 15 March, the Women’s Six Nations kicked off on 22 March with a flurry of excitement. SVG Europe spoke to Siobhán McCartan, head of broadcast partnerships at Six Nations Rugby, about the complex planning that has gone into making the production come to life.

Rights holders for the Women’s Six Nations, which ends on 26 April with a head-to-head between England and France, have stepped up this year. Throughout Europe they are bringing ever more coverage of the women’s game to viewers, with BBC Sport covering the whole of the UK, RTÉ and Virgin Media splitting coverage in Ireland, while in Italy the games can be viewed on Sky Italia, and in France it can be seen on France Télévisions.

“There’s a lot more focus on the presentation of the game on TV as well, so there’s more build up time, there’s more time for analysis afterwards. The investment that’s going into it from the broadcaster side around the presentation elements have all grown year on year, and people notice that when they watch the game”

McCartan comments on how she is seeing the coverage of the Women’s Six Nations increasing year on year. “Every year in recent years it’s gone up and up and up. It’s a mixture of broadcasters devoting more games to network slots, and obviously fans being more interested in the games as well. The broadcasters are helping us with that in terms of creating those opportunities to view on the major channels. Also, attendances going to the game are increasing massively. We don’t have attendances for this year yet, but last year, year on year, it was a 45% increase in attendances.

“Already this year in round two, the Wales game last week was in Principality Stadium and it was the largest attended women’s sports event in Wales ever,” she continues. “So we are finding that every year there’s almost a new record being broken and the unions are working really hard with selecting the right venues for the size of the crowd, and building that step by step, almost. For example, Twickenham will hold the final game of France versus England, and France; last year they had a match there for England versus Ireland that had 49,000 attendees at it. So they’d be looking to top that, but they’re selective in the games that they’re choosing to drive those audiences and make sure that it’s one, a positive experience for the players playing in those stadiums, and two, for the fans on the day.

“That does translate into broadcast as well,” McCartan says. “Obviously when you’re seeing these full stadiums, that’s quite a good broadcast product. So in terms of audience at the game, plus the audience watching social and digital platforms, they are all up year on year. The fantasy rugby game for the women’s is up year on year – I think it’s up 60% from last year to the previous – so across the board it’s definitely all going in the right direction for the women’s game, which is fantastic. ”

“Already this year in round two, the Wales game last week was in Principality Stadium and it was the largest attended women’s sports event in Wales ever”

Pushing the game

On how that growing popularity of for the Women’s Six Nations is growing, McCartan says it is a combination of the growth in women’s sport overall, as well as a team effort from the unions, Six Nations, and its rights holders to push the game at all levels.

She explains: “I think it is collaboration across the board and it’s the effort that is coming, from the teams, the unions, from the broadcasters. An example of what’s happening at the minute with the unions and with Six Nations is the women’s festival that is happening now,” she says.

“The fact that we have a wide diverse mix of host broadcast production teams, mixed with 11 out of 15 games having different stadiums, means that you have to work really, really in multiples in order to create that standardised product”

The Six Nations Under-18 Women’s Festival 2025 is held annually at Wellington College, Berkshire, UK. The festival is a key step on the development pathway for the brightest up-and-coming talents and provides an opportunity for players, coaches, analysts and match officials to develop their game.

McCartan continues: “It gives girls under the age of 18 an opportunity to represent their countries at a Six Nations event, and then as part of strengthening that pathway of rugby towards the next stage of their international career. And those pieces are all part of helping to drive the overall interest, because you need to have those pathways in place.”

She adds: “And hopefully we’ll see some of those people that are playing in the under-18s festival now kitted out in the Women’s Six Nations in a couple of years time as well.”

Rights holders are annually increasing not only their live coverage of the women’s game, but also what they do around that in terms of presentation and analysis. McCartan states: “The broadcasters have definitely upped their games. The viewership that we’re getting now in terms of France Télévisions on France 2, their main channel, you’re pushing up to the two million mark for the France home games now. The BBC is putting a lot more slots on the network as well. The Irish broadcasters – for a long time – have been putting the women’s games on linear. They’ve always done that, which is fantastic.

“But [across the broadcasters] there’s a lot more focus on the presentation of the game on TV as well, so there’s more build up time, there’s more time for analysis afterwards. The investment that’s going into it from the broadcaster side around the presentation elements have all grown year on year, and people notice that when they watch the game.”

The 2025 Women’s Six Nations ends with a
match between England and France at Twickenham, UK on the 26 April on Super Saturday

Working in multiples

There are a total of seven host productions that Six Nations standardises and oversees. “Our host broadcaster in each of our six competing regions will produce the games,” says McCartan, adding that in Ireland Six Nations itself is the host broadcaster, working with technical services provider NEP.

“The fact that we have a wide diverse mix of host broadcast production teams, mixed with 11 out of 15 games having different stadiums, means that you have to work really, really in multiples in order to create that standardised product. And that is the biggest challenge of it this year for sure,” states McCartan.

She adds: “It is a lot of host broadcasters to standardise for one product. That can be the challenging part from time to time, because you have a lot of different teams in different areas; the BBC will have Whisper, they’ll have BBC Wales, they’ll have BBC Scotland, so we have a lot of calls and a lot of communication. The teams are all fantastic obviously, but because there’s so many hosts and we also have 11 venues in the women’s game, you do at times have to start a game week to week with potentially a new broadcast team and a new venue.

“But overall it’s been very positive,” she continues. “We’ve got 145 territories that the matches go into so the standardisation of that host broadcast piece is crucial because no matter where you’re watching, you should be getting quite a similar product in terms of the standards.”

All graphics for the Women’s Six Nations are created by AE Live, while match stats come from Stats Perform.

Fresh for broadcast

New for the Women’s Six Nations this year is the 20 minute red card. This red card does not replace the regular red card for serious offences, but it applies to technical offences; the offending team can replace the removed player, to punish the player not the team, after the required 20 minute timeout has lapsed. In the broadcast, this new 20 minute red card will be explained in commentary and the graphics, and also, in another first for the women’s game, by the referee.

Referees are now ‘on mic’ in the stadiums for the Women’s Six Nations. McCartan explains: “The ref has always had a mic so they can speak to the television match officials (TMO), but those decisions or key moments until this year were never heard by the stadium. So now when [the referee] has a decision, they’ll signal it, and the stadium will announce that to the crowd, which is a really positive development. We had that in the men’s championship for the first time [this year] and now in the women’s for the first time as well.”

Also new is the BKT Award for the best rising player who has their first Six Nations cap, which will be broadcast in round five of the competition.

“We’re trying to deliver information to the fan in a comprehensive way,” notes McCartan. “And that’s often the trickiest bit, but it’s the most important as well really, because none of us will pretend that rugby is super straightforward in terms of the game. We’re all trying to make it easier for the fans to understand.”

For viewers in the UK, BBC Sport has live match coverage and video highlights of every game in the Women’s Six Nations as England seek to win a seventh title in a row. All England matches will be broadcast on network TV, iPlayer and the BBC Sport website and app. All other games will be available to watch on BBC iPlayer, the BBC Sport website and the BBC Sport app. There will be live text coverage and radio commentary on selected games, as well as Rugby Union Weekly podcasts covering all the latest news and debates.

The final game of the Women’s Six Nations – England versus France – will be held at Twickenham, UK on the 26 April on Super Saturday