Wasps wing combines international rugby with studies at Imperial College
London and is ready to make strides in both
Abby Dow is on a mission. Make that two. By this time next year she hopes to have qualified as a mechanical engineer and earned a professional playing contract from the Rugby
Football Union. She can give a boost to that latter ambition by performing as well against
France in Exeter on Saturday as she did against the same opposition during last week’s victory in Clermont-Ferrand.
Dow is one of only three players – along with Heather Kerr and Ellena Perry – in the
England squad for the autumn internationals not to have a full-time contract with the RFU, who signed up 28 players in January. Instead the winger has forced her way in by excelling for her club, Wasps, for whom she ran in seven tries in the first six matches of this season. She did well from the start in last week’s 20-10 win in France, which ended an 18-match unbeaten home record for the French stretching back to 2012. Keep this up and she will have a fair chance of gaining a full-time deal next year, by which time she should also have graduated from Imperial College London.