New Zealand rugby great Portia Woodman-Wickliffe is retiring from the international game after the 2024 Paris Olympics, she revealed today.
Speaking to Breakfast's Jenny-May Clarkson, Woodman-Wickliffe said: "I feel honoured that I have the choice to do it on my own terms."
Woodman-Wickliffe, 32, is one of rugby's most decorated players. Among her achievements are two World Cup titles with the Black Ferns, an Olympic gold medal from the Tokyo Olympics, and scorer of more than 250 tries on the sevens circuit.
She was 2015 World Rugby Women's Sevens Player of the Year, 2017 World Rugby Women's Player of the Year and in 2020 was named top women's sevens player of the decade.
She will make a third Olympics sevens appearance in Paris.
When asked by Clarkson what her highlights were, Woodman-Wickliffe said winning Commonwealth Games gold against Australia in 2018 was one, as was seeing the growth in the women's game.
The 2022 World Cup in New Zealand was a third, not just for the victory, but the way in which the country embraced the team, and the fact she got to run out at Whangārei's Semenoff Stadium, a pitch she considers one of her home grounds and one where members of her family had also played.
The much-decorated sevens and 15s star will retire from the international game after the 2024 Olympics. (Source: Breakfast)
Woodman-Wickliffe paid tribute to her whānau for instilling a sense of identity in her, and knowledge of those who came before.
Proudly Ngāpuhi and from Te Tai Tokerau, she said her heritage was a superpower.
"No-one else has that, no-one else in the world has that feeling of connection to our people that are here and gone."
Woodman-Wickliffe, who played rugby with boys while at school, was a professional netballer until 2012 when a New Zealand Rugby Go for Gold campaign — designed to identify female athletes from other sports to join the national women's sevens team — swooped.
At that stage, sevens was coming to the 2016 Olympics and New Zealand Rugby saw an opportunity to compete for a gold medal.
From the 800 women who tried out, Woodman-Wickliffe was one of 32 chosen for a training camp.
She was the top try scorer in Rio de Janeiro as the Black Ferns were forced to settle for silver, but gold was to come in Tokyo in 2020.
In an interview with the Associated Press last month it was put to Woodman-Wickliffe that she was perhaps the most recognisable women's rugby player in the world — much as former All Black the late Jonah Lomu was for the global game in his prime 20 years ago.
She revealed that that was something she had strived for since she was a nine-year-old watching highlights of Lomu scoring four tries in the All Blacks' semifinal win over England at the 1995 World Cup.
"I was watching a replay of him walking over the England boys in the World Cup and I said, 'Dad, I want to be the female Jonah Lomu.' And he said, 'Okay, Bub'."
Her father Kawhena and uncle Fred were both All Blacks.
She is married to fellow Black Ferns great Renee Woodman-Wickliffe and they have a daughter.
Woodman-Wickliffe said she would miss the sense of connection and competition that international rugby provided, battling with fellow veterans like Stacey Waaka and Michaela Blyde, and seeing the next generation come though.
Thoughts of retirement emerged after the 2022 World Cup win, especially after she suffered a bad concussion in the final, but she said she was proud to have fought her way back to peak condition.
Woodman-Wickliffe was now looking forward to performing in front of her parents, wife and daughter on the world stage for a final time.
"I still see Paris as just another tournament, whether it was Olympics or whether it was my last, I still see it as another tournament," she said.
"I froth rugby, I love it. I can't imagine it being any more or any less than it actually is. Any chance I get to play, whether it's trial games here in Tauranga or whether it's in the black jersey on the world stage, I love rugby and for me Paris is just the pinnacle obviously, the Olympics is the pinnacle but I love those high stakes moments, the pressure that they bring. Yes now it's my last, I'm excited for it, I don't want it at all to be 'oh it's Portia's last, let's do it for her'. I don't want that. I just want to go out there and perform and I want to be the best team in the world."
New Zealand Rugby chief executive Mark Robinson said it was "impossible to measure the impact" Woodman-Wickliffe had on rugby.
"She is a once in a generation player who reached the pinnacle on the field, on multiple occasions, and off the field has helped to grow the women's game across the globe, where she is an incredible ambassador and represents everything great about our sport," he said.
Black Ferns Sevens coach Cory Sweeney said she would be "hugely missed" and would go forth having left a legacy behind her.
"It's been a real privilege to be part of Portia's journey over the past eight years, watching her dominate and influence the game makes me feel incredibly prod."
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