Jasmine Joyce not hanging up Wales boots as she targets third Olympics

Last updated on 8 June 20238 June 2023.From the section Rugby Union

Despite chasing her dream of competing at a third Olympic Games, Great Britain rugby sevens star Jasmine Joyce says she is far from ready to stop playing union.

Joyce, 27, left Wales' professional 15-a-side programme after last year's Rugby World Cup and missed the 2023 Women's Six Nations.

Instead she returned to the World Sevens Series where she hopes to qualify for Paris 2024, having represented GB at Rio 2016 and Tokyo 2020.

Joyce says it was a "hugely difficult choice" shelving her union career.

"We'd just come back from a successful World Cup, full-time contracts in place, the first time that had happened, so it was a huge choice to come here and represent Great Britain.

"My next goal is to compete in an Olympic Games and to do that I had to sacrifice playing with Wales and come up here and take a full-time contract [with the sevens]."

Joyce, a native of St Davids, Pembrokeshire, travels all over the world on the sevens circuit, with the open space suiting her attributes, most notably her electric speed.

"Seven suits me... I can perform better on a sevens pitch than a fifteens pitch," she told BBC Sport Wales.

"I love the occasion and atmosphere of fifteens. Getting to sing the national anthem every time you play is such a special moment.

"Also, my friends and family can come and watch in Wales, England, Ireland, whereas in sevens it's so tough for them to get out to places like Dubai, Cape Town, Australia and New Zealand."

In her absence, Wales rose to their highest-ever world ranking of sixth having won three Six Nations games for the first time since 2009.

Joyce made her long-awaited Wales debut in the 2017 Six Nations against Scotland, and has won 31 caps to date.

"I'd love to go back to Wales and play with them, that's the way I'm thinking, although I don't know what the coaches are thinking," she said.

"The Six Nations is such a huge occasion and after the Olympic Games there's obviously a fifteens World Cup which is something I'd potentially go back to, although I don't know how that would fit in with my schedule."

But one thing Joyce is sure of: "100% I've not hung my 15s boots for Wales up yet."

Despite Wales' success it is no surprise that Joyce's Olympic dream still burns strongly.

Twice her hopes of an Olympic medal have fallen short in the bronze medal match, with fourth place finishes at Rio and Tokyo.

Should they win gold at the European Games, which start in Krakow on 25 June, they will qualify for next year's Olympics in Paris.

"It's huge for us and it's something we've prepared for all year," said Joyce.

"We've had an opportunity to compete as Great Britain on the world circuit which has never been done prior to an Olympic Games before.

"Krakow now is our final straw, we are so ready, we've had an opportunity to play the best teams in the world all through the year."

GB women finished seventh in the 2022-23 World Sevens Series, one place below Ireland who will likely be their stiffest competition in Poland.

"Some of these teams are unknown, we don't play them week in week out, different teams like Italy and Belgium, we don't have much on them," said Joyce.

"All we can do is best prepare ourselves and be as ready as we can be to go out there and qualify for the Olympics."

You can hear more of the interview with Jasmine Joyce on BBC Radio Wales' "Rob Phillips and Molly Stephens" Show on Saturday from 14:00 BST.