By saracensfan62
July 12 2026

PWR Semi-Finals and Final 2025-26 Analysis Many of us were lucky enough to witness the pinnacle of the PWR season where everything is on the line, and only one team can be crowned champions - PWR final. I liked the contrast between the two teams in the final. Saracens all the history behind them while Trailfinders arrived with momentum and freedom that comes with having already broken one major assumption when they silenced the shed by beating Gloucester in their own backyard. For Saracens, yet another chance to turn sustained excellence into silverware. For Trailfinders, a first PWR final and a direct challenge to the old order. Blockbuster match up indeed.

The Road to glory

Sarries were second in the regular season table with an extraordinary record throughout the regular season. 14 wins from 16, scoring 741 points with a mammoth points difference of +497. The semi-final was anything but comfortable though and it took a 74 minyute Jess Breach try to help Saracens to a 40-38 win over Exeter Chiefs at StoneX in a 12-try thriller that showed both the brilliance and the vulnerabilities of the team. Exeter found dominance in points in the physical battle but Sarries managed to outfox their defence at key points and scored points where they could. The ref certainly didn’t help either with many weird and unexplainable decisions.

Both Olivia Apps and Jess Breach scored braces, while Alysha Corrigan got her customary try on the wing. Even as that trio impressed, yet again Harrison stood head and shoulders above the rest with her pinpoint kicking and effortless running lines.

Ealing Trailfinders have produced the story of the season. The west Londoners only joined the PWR  4 years ago( correct me if im wrong?) but produced a remarkable semi-final display at Kingsholm to get to the PWR final. Gloucester-Hartpury made the better start but then the visitors hit back to lead 24-7 at half-time. The hosts rallied after the break as Rachel Lund and Georgia Brock both crossed to close the gap to three points, but another ealing try restored Trailfinders' cushion at 29-21. They went onto win against probably the favourites for the entire competition. A first knockout win in their history, away from home, against the three-time reigning champions. The audacity to do such a thing.

PWR Semi Finals Analysis

Semi Final 1

Gloucester-Hartpury 26–29 Ealing Trailfinders

There are upsets, and then there is this. Ealing Trailfinders Women stunned three-time and defending champions Gloucester-Hartpury 29-26 to reach their first Premiership Women's Rugby final.

It didn't start well for them though, with Ealing starting strongly but the momentum quickly shifted and Gloucester scored the first points ten minutes in. Tatyana Heard powered through between the posts after significant forward pressure after a dominant scrum from the cherry and whites. The Gloucester fly-half converted but that was as good as it got for the home side in the first half.

What followed was a remarkable 30-minute burst that effectively won the match for the away team despite only 0.5 of the game having been played. Trailfinders delivered the perfect response when Maya Montiel (an ex Saracen herself!) scored her first PWR try of the season after a collective team effort in the forwards and the tries kept coming for the visitors. Meg Jones, Isla Norman-Bell and Emma Uren all got on the scoresheet in emphatic fashion. The last of the many tries came after Jones collected a cross-field kick and offloaded beautifully in a switch move, saw Trailfinders lead 24-7 at half-time. The Glos faithful were in shock and the Ealing supporters delighted. Glouester needed a response and they needed it urgently if they wanted to regain control of the game.

They started the second half with newfound energy. Their hard work was rewarded when Rachel Lund scored in the corner after a brilliant offload. George converted and with the 'Queensholm' crowd only getting louder, the comeback continued for the home team and the gap narrowed to 3 points. With ½ hour or so left and the crowd roaring, the script for a famous Gloucester-Hartpury rescue act was being written. Trailfinders, to their enormous credit, refused to let it unfold. Ealing responded with another Norman-Bell try to give them valuable breathing room. Gloucester's late consolation through Dallavalle made for an agonising final quarter, but Trailfinders held on and forced Gloucstr back into their own 22m before kicking it out to the delight of the away support. Not what we were expecting and a real shock for both sets of supporters.

Semi Final 2

Saracens Women 40–38 Exeter Chiefs Women

This semi was less underdogs and out-of-the-blue magic moments, more about holding nerve and one of the more astonishing individual tries of the season. Saracens had momentum going in after a run of three straight wins, including a rout of Trailfinders on the final weekend of the regular season, while Packer was making her final home appearance for the club.

The opening was blistering. Despite an early Moloney-MacDonald try for Exeter and another score later on, Alysha Corrigan, Jess Breach, Donna Rose and Olivia Apps went over to put Saracens firmly in control at 28-12 up. It looked like it might be a procession and Sarries could march into the final virtually untouched. Then came the pivotal moment. On her final home appearance, Marlie Packer got sin binned for a cynical tackle (less than 10m away from the Exeter 9 after she tapped and went) and this opened the door for Exeter, who capitalised on their numerical advantage with Amy Rule and Moloney-MacDonald reducing their arrears to 28-26. The visitors then completed the turnaround at the end of the first half with Hope Rogers, who had crossed for their second try, going over again to put them in front. Half-time was called and it was 31-28 to Exeter. The StoneX was stunned and the chiefs fans delighted.

Saracens emerged from the break with renewed energy and immediately pinned Exeter deep inside their own half. Their pressure paid off as Apps crossed for her second try of the afternoon to restore the lead. The second half continued to swing from end to end, with Exeter refusing to go away and responding with another score beneath the posts to keep the contest finely balanced heading into the closing stages.  With five minutes left and the result still in the balance, nobody other than Jess Breach produced her moment. Collecting possession deep inside her own half she brushed aside two defenders before sprinting clear from inside the Saracens half to score a sensational try in the chiefs corner and send StoneX Stadium into celebration. That proved to be the decisive score as Saracens held firm to secure a memorable victory and book their place in the PWR Final. The ball was kicked off the field and us sarries fans went into raptures.

This match was up there with the most entertaining I’ve ever had the pleasure of watching.

The PWR Final

Saracens Women 52–14 Ealing Trailfinders Women

Trailfinders arrived at The Stoop having toppled the three-time champions at their own ground a fortnight before. Surely the story had one more chapter? More often than not against Saracens, it does’nt. Saracens were imperious from the first whistle to the last, and the final scoreline a record winning margin of 38 points in a PWR Final. Sarries dominant, with a rare moment from Ealing but this was rare rather than commonplace.

The opening exchanges were really tight. Trailfinders dominance led to them all the way up to the five-metre line but a wonderful Marlie Packer turnover meant they could not convert and Saracens survived, winning a penalty and them a scrum, penalty to allow them to get further down the field.

That collective clinical edge was what separated the sides in the early exchanges. Sarries managed to break the deadlock around the 10 min mark, Saracens made Trailfinders pay as Julia Omokhuale dotted down after some wonderfully powerful carrying near the line, with Harrison scoring the conversion. Marlie Packer went over for her first of the afternoon in her final game for Saracens after nine years in red and black and then Packer picked up her second much to the delight of the wolfpack faithful.  Sydney Gregson extended the Saracens lead ahead of half-time, while a yellow card for Gabrielle Senft for a deliberate knock-on in the final minute meant Trailfinders had a player advantage going in yet still trailed by 26 points. They had a mountain to climb.

Any hopes of an immediate response after the interval were dashed when Breach screeched over in the 41st minute, with last-ditch tackles from Meg Jones and Rosie Inman unable to stop her. Saracens were beginning to show their variety, working the ball from one touchline to the other as Corrigan earned a deserved try. After sustained Ealing pressure, Marlie Packer cynically kicked the ball away from the Ealing 9 to stop her taking a quick tap. Cheeky. The referee was not going to let that one go and marlie got sin binned. She was met by enormous cheers from the Sarries faithful despite the circumstances of her heading off the field.

Trailfinders got on the board with a try, but the respite was fleeting as Harrison added to her four conversions with a score, sprinting under the posts before converting her own try. With the result almost out of sight, Trailfinders were able to play more freely anand they did muscle over to score giving them 12 points in the game. However, it was Sarries who had the final say with a second try for Breach before the party on the pitch truly began as the final whistle blew. Donna Rose had May Campbell on her back piggyback style and it was carnage as the red and black army celebrated a wonderful victory.

Fanbase Comparison and Atmosphere

I thought I'd do something a bit different here and look at the play-off fortnight as a story about the supporters too. All 4four fanbases brought something distinct  to these landmark matches and cheering in different ways and manners.

Gloucester-Hartpury
The Kingsholm faithful give Gloucester their own nickname for the womens team, now known as Queensholm. There was no doubt that the fans delivered on the atmosphere. With the 'Queensholm' crowd only getting louder as the home side's second-half comeback began from 24-7 down, the noise in the stadium as Lund and Brock cut the deficit to three points was described by commentators as intense. Glos didn't get the result they wanted, but the support which has been built of decades of rugby heritage definitely made an extremely electric and emotionally charged atmosphere of the semi-final weekend.

Ealing Trailfinders
For a club that only joined the PWR a few years ago, Trailfinders' fanbase has grown rapidly. Their supporters made the trip to Gloucester in significant numbers and their noise in the first half when the team ran in four unanswered tries was unquestionable. There was something joyful and fresh about the manner in which they played rugby, without the weight of expectation Gloucester fans carried. At Stoop in the final, the west London crowd added their voice, though the scoreline made it a quieter afternoon than they'd hoped compared to the Sarries supporters.

Exeter Chiefs  
Exeter's support is fiercely loyal for a club that regularly punches above its weight in big match fixtures. The Chiefs fans in the StoneX semi-final were outnumbered but cheered when they could, and their backing as Exeter turned a 28-12 deficit into a 31-28 half-time lead was genuinely electric. Apps was hoping the home crowd would make a difference, and they did, but Exeter's fans pushed back with real volume of their own when their side were in front at the break.

Saracens
For sheer volume and size, I would say that we took the all round win. The all-London final was played in front of 8,099 fans at Twickenham Stoop which was a record number for a PWR final, this definitely being another sign of how quickly the women's game is growing and the enthusiasm. With the scoreline in hand early on, sarries faithful turned The Stoop into a cauldron of red and black and an atmosphere to match. I daresay 6k plus of the people there were in Sarries shirts or supporting Sarries. When Packer went over for her brace of tries, the roar was pure emotion and heart. We are a fanbase saying goodbye to a legend and we supported her in that way. I’d say we were, without question, the noisiest supporters across the play-off fortnight. Come on you Sarries!