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‘Scotland is lucky have Rachel Malcolm’: Emma Wassell ahead of captain's half-century cap
By Gary Heatly
Emma Wassell’s first memory of Rachel Malcolm is when the former was lagging behind the latter in a bronco fitness test at a Scotland training camp back in 2016, but ever since that day they have been alongside each other on and off the pitch and the two of them have become the best of friends.
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On Saturday, Loughborough Lightning back-row Malcolm, 33, will earn her 50th Scotland cap when she captains her country versus Italy in their WXV 2 opener in the DHL Stadium in Cape Town.
Sadly, Wassell, the 29-year-old Lightning second-row who has 67 caps for her country, will not be there as she is missing the trip due to a tumour in her chest which needs surgery.
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But she will be watching on from home and will likely shed a tear – and crack a smile – when her great mate reaches the half-century milestone.
“Rach has quite literally been a rock for me during this year, a year which has been a very tough one for me personally,” Wassell, who lost her mother Pauline in April and was then diagnosed with the aforementioned tumour a few weeks ago, said.
“In fact, she has not just been a rock for me this year, but ever since we met and I really could not have a better best friend in my corner, she means the world to me.
“I feel so lucky to have her in my life, both in terms of rugby and away from rugby, and I am obviously devastated not to be in South Africa to see her getting presented with her 50th cap, but she knows I’m there in spirit and I’m sending her all the love and good vibes ahead of a special day.
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“She is such a special player and person to every one of us in the Scotland set up and we could not ask for a better leader. We recently got to number five in the world for the first time and she has led that charge – I am super proud of her.
“And one of the best things about Rach is that she has never changed. Even though she is captain and has loads more to do during a match week than the rest of us, she is still the same person that I met eight years ago.
“She has such a nice nature about her and has time for everyone whether that is an in-depth chat about rugby or just a friendly word about something else, she will always make time and she is very selfless in that regard.”
As mentioned, it was in 2016 when Wassell and Malcolm first met.
“I had been in the Scotland squad for a couple of years by that point and Shade Munro was the head coach and he was really trying to drive the women’s programme forward and was keen to bring different types of athletes into the squad,” Wassell, who has been a housemate of Malcolm’s in recent years, recounts.
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“One day Sarah Bonar, who we found out had been a rower, and Rach, who we later found out was a hockey player, pitched up to our training camp as part of the athlete talent ID programme that Shade was running.
“We were doing a bronco test and, out of nowhere, Rach finished it ahead of everyone else and the more experienced rugby players in the group were looking at each other and jokingly saying ‘Who does she think she is?!’
“She was just going about her business and it was clear from that first day just how fit and athletic she was from her time in hockey and, most importantly, just how focused and driven she was to show what she could do.
“Those standards that she set herself that day have never left her and although her rugby knowledge – as she would freely admit! – wasn’t of the highest level back then you could tell we had something pretty special on our hands and it was great to get to know her back then and build a friendship that has lasted to this day.”
Malcolm, who had played age-grade hockey for Scotland previously before this switch in sport, had only taken up rugby during the 2015/16 season at Lichfield and started off playing hooker and back-row.
She made her Scotland debut late in 2016 off the bench against Spain in a Rugby World Cup 2017 qualifier at Scotstoun in her home city of Glasgow and, after an injury-disrupted start, has been pretty much ever-present since.
Malcolm first captained her country in 2018 before then head coach Philip Doyle gave her the role permanently in 2019 and she has led from the front from then.
Scotland have had plenty of highs and lows in the last five years or so since she took on the leadership role, but the highs are now much more regular and the squad have been to their first World Cup in over a decade, won WXV in 2023, have won 10 of their last 13 Tests and are now at an all-time best of fifth in the world rankings.
That has all come on Malcolm’s watch and Wassell continued: “As a player, as a captain and as a friend, Rach is just the best you could hope for.
“As a captain, she has that great ability of always knowing what to say at any given moment. She doesn’t shout or just say things for the sake of it, every word has meaning and that is a real skill.
“She sees everyone in the team as a person way before a player and she, along with the management team and others such as vice-captain Helen Nelson, have created a Scotland environment where everyone is able to be themselves and that is special.
“Rach’s family are her biggest supporters and having got to know them over the years and been invited on their family holiday to Corfu in the summer just gone it is easy to see where she gets all her good traits from.
“She is her own person, but everything she does is for the team. Playing for Scotland means so much to her and playing for her in a Scotland shirt means so much to all of us as players.
“Scotland as a country is lucky to have Rachel Malcolm as women’s rugby captain – and I am very lucky to have her as a friend.”
