England World Cup winner Dow retires aged 28

Abby Dow, England’s winning wing, announced her retirement from rugby at the age of 28.

I’m absolutely capable of attending another World Cup, I could travel to Lions, and I do appreciate that they are significant opportunities.

I think I’ve given as much as I can in this type of the game as possible, and I’m just ready for the next step because I’m also so excited for different chapters of my life.

We fully respect her decision to move on to a new chapter, said England head coach John Mitchell, but I personally believe we are losing arguably the best right wing player in world rugby at the height of her abilities.

She enjoyed finishing with an awkward number and 59 caps after making her debut in 2017. She then went on to score 50 tries in the process. It’s awkward, but I believe it to be perfect.

Dow’s intentions to quit the sport had been known. She left her Trailfinders contract at the end of the 2024-2019 season and started playing for Wasps, Harlequins, and Ealing in Premiership Women’s rugby.

She told BBC Sport that she had initially intended to play only one World Cup, but that she had decided to move on after her 2022 defeat to New Zealand. She sat in the changing room and said, “I wanted to carry on.

She was aware that her rugby career was about to come to an end as Dow, a world champion, sat in the Twickenham changing room three years later.

She said, “I’m really happy with my lot here; I think the opportunity I’ve had is incredible and brilliant.”

Throughout her England career, Dow’s personality has proliferated.

Off the field, she gained notoriety for her crocheting, making jokes, and dressing up as the brother’s fancy dress for England games.

England fans quickly adopted the pattern Dow lived in when she was away from the rugby pitch during the 2025 World Cup, with the Women’s Institute creating a “yarnbombing” artwork in Northampton before the Red Roses’ pool-stage meeting with Samoa.

How two extraordinarily different worlds could combine, as well as the crochet love, surprised Dow.

She said, “I think it’s really important in women’s spaces that we don’t stereotype.”

You could easily stereotype the WI, but in reality they were a group of women who supported anyone, cheered loudly, and actually participated.

It just goes to show that there isn’t a cap on a young girl picking up a rugby ball for the first time, and there wasn’t. There isn’t a cap on my ability to compete professionally or soon enough, and there isn’t a cap on the ability of a woman to join the WI community.

A life in engineering is now beckoning for Dow, who had to balance her early years playing rugby with her studies.

No jobs are available, but she is in discussions with various businesses in a field that she describes as “so logical – it’s literally a bit of me.”

She said, “I do love probably the automotive industry, that kind of engineering where it’s quite high performance.”

You’re attempting to design the best, push yourself, and push yourself as well as the engineering, and learn new things and things you haven’t yet learned.

She declares she won’t turn her back on the game as she enters her new engineering life, which comes naturally with a small crochet World Cup.

Some of her fondest memories from growing up are with her sister Ruth and brother Chris playing on different pitches before asking their parents for the one pound to travel to the clubhouse to buy the chips. She first picked up a ball at Maidenhead when she was five and moved to Reading at the age of five.

She continued, “I think I will probably return to the game because I enjoy it.”

I’m confident that my professional career is over and that I’m ready to pursue a different path in life. Rugby is fun because you can love it in so many different ways, and that’s what I believe is true.

It’s there for you to watch, not just for you to play. You can volunteer for it, too. It belongs to a family, after all. I look back and see how it all began for me when it was a family affair, and I hope it will continue in some ways.