At the heart of China’s rugby ambitions on the island of Hainan in the South China Sea, there’s an obvious outsider. The height of his playing CV reads Edinburgh Accies and Murrayfield Wanderers but this Scotsman, aged just 35, is the driving force behind China’s Olympic challenge at Tokyo 2020. Euan Mackintosh is the most influential Scottish coach you’ve never heard of.

At the 2016 Rio Olympics, New Zealand won eighteen medals, the biggest haul in their history and a stark contrast to 2000, when they took just four back across the Tasman. Among those leading the change was a Scottish-born synchronised swimmer called Katie Sadleir, now she’s trying to create even bigger change, in women’s rugby. 

Four years after the Cadbury brothers gave us Dairy Milk, and six years before they delivered Milk Tray, the world’s most famous chocolatiers gave us Bournville RFC. More than a century later, the club have finally joined their plastic-wrapped Bournville siblings on the national stage. 

At the end of the game, she could feel the tears in the crowd. The journey had come to an end. Ruby Tui, a girl inspired by her superhero mum, who could so easily have taken so many wrong turns, was on top of the world.

The pain shot like a bolt between his shoulders, unlike anything he’d ever felt. He was out running and looked towards strangers in the park, pondering whether to ask for their help. Deciding against it, Clive Griffiths ran home instead and, hours later, was in the ICU having had a heart attack.

Just west of France on an island stretching nine miles by five, you’ll find one of the ten oldest buildings in the world, deserted Nazi war tunnels, a booming financial centre, two languages and the best rugby side outside of the Premiership, the Jersey Reds.

Her father was a pimp and her mother was a prostitute. Aged 18 months old, she was abandoned and raised in care. Education was her way out and she went on to manage a supermodel, Michelin-starred chefs, Peter Gabriel and become the most influential woman in English rugby. ‘Remarkable’ doesn’t begin to do justice to the story of Maria Pedro.

In the summer of 2017, Lichfield Ladies had their ‘heart ripped out’ by the RFU’s decision not to give them a ticket to the Premier 15s party. The team that had produced Emily Scarratt and Sarah Hunter was sent into oblivion. Almost everyone left. But one team is not a club and Lichfield Ladies have roared again, loud enough for Leicester Tigers to come knocking.  

The first time Portugal qualified for a Rugby World Cup in 2007, the campaign had included 83-0 defeats, having guns pulled on them in Uruguay, and then getting drawn against the All Blacks at the main event. This time around, for France 2023, they did it the hard way.

In the days of the British Empire, Nottingham was the epicentre of the world’s lace trade. It was then that a lace baron by the name of Birkin sewed the first stitch in turning the city’s rugby club into one of the nation’s finest.

At a Rugby World Cup where the Russians tried to fund themselves by selling contraband, the French barely made it at all, and England and New Zealand were favourites, a USA team featuring the ‘locks from hell’, the ‘mother of rugby’, a stunt woman hand-picked by Burt Reynolds, and coached by a Welsh PE teacher, pulled off one of the sport’s greatest shocks.

Aged nineteen, Jimmy Gopperth walked into a changing room with Jonah Lomu, Christian Cullen and Tana Umaga. All he had to do, he was told by the All Blacks’ captain, was ‘be loud and push us around the field’. That was the easy bit. What wasn’t so easy, was displacing Dan Carter.

Negotiating with naked head coaches, bartering shares in Cardiff airport, finding dates with pop stars, there’s little rugby agents haven’t had to contend with in the relatively brief era of professionalism. But in an industry where there are just 700 professionals being served by 115 agents, it’s little wonder they’re always willing to go the extra mile.

George Kruis freely admits he was crap at rugby. A late developer, he joined his local club for the beers and barbecues rather than trophies, but ended up winning them by the shedload. Even in Japan, he’s on course for back-to-back titles. But there won’t be one last tilt at a World Cup. Aged 32, he’s finishing. On a high.

They were the pioneers in women’s rugby. They attracted the best players in the world. They won leagues and cups. They broke records. And then, it stopped. They lost a visionary coach, a squad of players, their place in the top flight, and then, eventually, their second and third teams. But the Richmond story isn’t over yet. Just ask Kapo.

On a mountain in Alaska, having seen her Olympic dream come to an end, in her mind Alev Kelter battled everything. She questioned celibacy, her sexuality, her life goals, her purpose. And she found answers. Then, back at the lodge, rugby found her.

In the South Hams, the prettiest of places you’ve probably never visited, the women of Ivybridge RFC are challenging for honours. At the helm? Possibly rugby’s only husband and wife team, Georgie and Ben Gulliver. 

On 6 August 2021, Old Elthamians announced the club would not be fulfilling their fixtures in National League One. A team that was founded 110 years ago would have to start the season without a first team. This is the story of how it happened, what happened next and the rebuilding of a proud rugby club…

In the Bricklayers Arms they flicked a coin to see which way they would go, to a man committed to the result. Heads, amateur dramatics. Tails, rugby. The Queen landed face down and the Shoreditch creatives headed for Hackney Marshes.

In 22 seconds, the ball went from one end of the pitch to another, passing through the hands of eight Barbarians, with jinks, dummies and attempted decapitations in between. It was the try, one that will never be forgotten, just like the man who scored it, Sir Gareth Edwards.