“Combatantes” traces the long history of women’s rugby (and it’s exciting)

Today we are no longer surprised to see women playing rugby, and they are still happy. However, if the sport originated in 1823 (legend has it that it was invented by William Web Ellis, a 17-year-old English student, during a football match at his school of … Rugby), women have long been excluded. At the beginning of the 1920s this sport was considered dangerous, lacking in elegance, doctors even believed that, given the too fragile constitution of women, rugby represented a danger for them. Better: we think above all that it is not their role, that of concentrating on procreation … It was finally necessary to wait until the Sixties for women’s rugby to become more common, not without numerous criticisms, even from sports women, like the French champion of tennis Suzanne Lenglen who said that “rugby played by women has nothing aesthetic”.

In a documentary comic, illustrated by Sophie Bouxom, author Isabelle Collombat traces the long (and sometimes chaotic) history of women’s rugby. “Combatantes – Rugby, une histoire de femmes” was published in October by Éditions Acte Sud Junior, and it’s fascinating.

Interview with Isabelle Collombat, author of “Combatantes – Rugby, a story of women”

To miss. What are the reasons why you wanted to write this book?

Isabella Colombat. One day, just over two years ago, my German publisher asked me to write a text on rugby, a Southwestern sport in his eyes “typically French” and “considered very virile”. For my part, I was not very motivated. I rather wanted to write about sporty women. But at the time I didn’t know if women’s rugby existed. After some research, I finally discovered that the players were very numerous and that the French team was already among the best in the world. I also learn at that moment that, if the numbers of the French Rugby Federation are making progress, it is thanks to the girls. Half of the current graduates are under the age of 18! I immediately perceived it, in women’s rugby, and this is what I like very much, an energy, a desire, an enthusiasm that I did not know anywhere else. So I very quickly proposed to Actes Sud and my editor, Isabelle Péhourticq, to ​​write a comic about the history of rugby through the women’s prism. She accepted, and that’s how I immersed myself in this project with immense joy.

Who knows that women (…) have been playing rugby underground for years?

Isabella Colombat.

How did you write?

Trained journalist, I first read everything I found on women’s rugby, in the few books, mainly specialized, very rich and very acute works, but also on the Internet and in the press. It was there that I realized that the history of women’s rugby was very recent and still completely unknown, which had not yet been told to the general public. I mean that sport is not just a sum of races and results, it is much more. As for women’s rugby, it’s an epic. How many women, sometimes very young, sometimes already mothers, have made efforts and sacrifices to play rugby, overcome prejudices and criticisms!

Who knows, for example, that in 1972 they weren’t allowed to play the sport they loved and practiced clandestinely for years? And that the French rugby federation only integrated them in 1989, while the players were recognized by the football federation in 1970? To find out what happened, I contacted the first players, the pioneers of rugby in the 60s and 70s. These women left me speechless. I found them fantastic.

And in the end I interviewed a whole group of women who have played rugby often at the highest level and at all times since 1965. Of course, the current players of French rugby teams XV and VII as well. I also talked to men who knew they were their allies. At the same time, of course, I went to see the matches in Bobigny, in the Paris region, and in Toulouse in particular. And I didn’t miss any TV games I could watch. Finally, I had a huge amount of material, hours of recordings, mountains of documents. We had to fix everything to make a comic …

What do you hope this book brings to those who read it?

Telling this story, moreover in comics, is first of all to make visible the story of these women who have overcome prohibitions, insults, contempt and who have given much of themselves to be able to simply practice the sport they loved. Most of today’s young footballers are unaware of all this, even if, even today, they too are sometimes insulted on social media..

However, this comic is not just for those who practice rugby or a sport in general. “Combatantes” is the story of women who struggle to exist as they are, to live freely and express themselves as they see fit. This story is made up of suffering, of difficulty, but it is also joyful and galvanizing. I laughed a lot during my meetings with rugby players and then with Sophie Bouxom, the cartoonist of the comic. It is no coincidence that Sophie’s line and colors go towards the light.

What would you say to a child who does not dare to engage in this sport, or to her parents, who might think it is a “boy’s sport”?

I would tell parents to listen to their daughter. A child who makes a wish, a wish, is fantastic! Their daughter will not become a “tomboy” by hiding an opponent, but a “successful girl”. To a little girl I would say that only her desire should guide her. If she wants to try, she must try. Better to say: “well, finally no, this sport is not for me” … rather than “I wanted but I was too afraid …” From what I have heard, girls who are shy or unsure of themselves really acquire self-confidence themselves. For example, they are no longer afraid to speak in class. Those who are not thin, but very tall or very strong, find that they are powerful and that the team relies on them. Everyone learns to see their body as a friend, not an enemy, to accept it and even love it. Above all, they understand that only solidarity and sharing make them girls and women fulfilled. In a word, free.

“Combatantes – Rugby, a story of women”, Acte Sud Junior Editions, 23 €