The organiser of Women’s Rugby World Cup (WRWC) was determined to create a tournament that would celebrate a growing love for the sport and inspire future generations. To do that, it needed the fans, ticketholders and an entire nation to be engaged. Here, Steve Adams (pictured below), senior producer at The Sports Presentation Company (TSPC), reveals how TSPC and Smyle worked together to deliver fan plazas and sports presentation services at WRWC that delivered the high-energy and unforgettable experiences the tournament’s organiser wanted.

How long have you been working on this project?

We came on board in November 2024 after a competitive pitch process that had been running for more than a year. With a project of this scale, a long runway was essential. From day one we were focused on detail, recceing all eight venues – Stadium of Light (Sunderland), Salford Community Stadium, York Community Stadium, Franklin’s Gardens (Northampton), Ashton Gate (Bristol), Sandy Park (Exeter), Amex Stadium (Brighton), and Allianz Twickenham (London) – to understand everything from complex cable runs to the potential of fan plazas. Each stadium brought unique challenges, from intimate 8,500-seat spaces to the vast 82,000-seat Allianz Twickenham.

Our job was to translate this complexity into a delivery model that would give every fan the same high-energy experience, no matter where they attended.

How did you win the project?

We were invited to pitch and saw it as a once-in-a-generation opportunity. Too often sports presentation can feel formulaic, but we knew the Women’s Rugby World Cup demanded more.

Our approach started with the audience: how could we not only captivate a growing fanbase for women’s rugby but also help change the face of women’s sport?

We presented a strategy built around inclusivity and longevity. The tournament wasn’t just about England or the final; it was about engaging every host city, every community, and every fan, and converting their curiosity into lasting passion.

Our clients told us this approach stood out: a vision for sports presentation they hadn’t seen before. Together with World Rugby, our collective objective became clear: create a tournament more accessible than ever, reward fans with entertainment and unique content, and build an energy that turned attendees into ambassadors.

These might sound like obvious questions, but what was the brief and what exactly did you provide to WRWC?

The brief was to bring World Rugby’s message – This Energy Never Stops– to life. The Women’s Rugby World Cup was positioned as a generational moment, so our job was to ensure the experiences off the pitch matched the brilliance on it.

We built a journey that started the moment fans arrived. Plazas became vibrant festival-style spaces with live music, interactive activations, and theatrical moments that set the tone before kick-off. Inside the bowl, female DJs and hosts led mass singalongs and energised crowds with personality and authenticity. The pre-match show was carefully structured to crescendo at the moment the teams walked out – creating a wave of noise and emotion that carried into the game.

Is what you created delivered vastly different to what was pitched?

The delivery stayed remarkably true to our original pitch, a real testament to having a clear vision from the outset. Naturally, we adapted along the way: tailoring activations to suit each venue and scaling up engagement as the tournament gathered momentum.

Who at Smyle project managed the WRWC contract and how big was the team working on it?

From a core pitch team of around ten, we scaled up to more than 500 accredited staff and engaged 1,750 volunteers across the tournament. It was a genuine team effort – the synergy between The Sports Presentation Company’s expertise in live sport and Smyle’s ability to manage projects at scale was central to delivering such a complex operation.

What outcomes was WRWC trying to achieve?

World Rugby saw this as a catalyst for change – not just for women’s rugby, but for women’s sport worldwide. The ambition was to create the biggest, most attended, most watched, most celebrated Women’s Rugby World Cup in history.

Our role was to make that ambition real through sports presentation and fan experience that inspired new audiences, created a sense of belonging, and turned a sporting event into a cultural milestone.

What challenges did you face whilst working on WRWC?

The geographical spread of venues was a huge challenge, with the tournament designed so that no fan was more than two hours from a game. That meant delivering consistent, high-energy experiences across a wide range of stadia, some with world-class infrastructure, others where we had to build systems from scratch.

By embedding local teams at each venue, we created a sense of ownership and consistency while Smyle’s logistics team orchestrated complex planning to ensure assets could be shared and scaled across multiple sites.

What would you say were the big successes?

The biggest success was seeing our strategy come alive. Fan plazas turned into joyful, inclusive spaces; in-bowl activations created moments of collective energy; and fans left feeling they had been part of something bigger than a match.

Player arrivals became iconic, by the time England stepped off the bus at Allianz Twickenham, the atmosphere was electric. But what mattered most were the unexpected moments: the Scottish team arriving in York and being visibly moved by the noise and warmth of the welcome, or seeing families and new fans embrace an environment where everyone felt included. These were the signs that the tournament had exceeded expectations, creating energy that reached far beyond the stadia.

For example, across the tournament there were:

• 444,465 tickets sold
• 92 per cent average attendance, with 52 per cent of fans being female
• 219 million views from players’ social accounts
• 56.13 million broadcast views
• 905 million social impressions
• 81,885 fans at Allianz Twickenham – a world record for a women’s game

What was it about the fan plazas that stood out?

The plazas became destinations in their own right. At their heart was the “changing room stage”, a presenting space with live music and a backdrop featuring every competing nation’s shirt. Surrounding that were drummers, actors, and theatrical walkabouts like the “muddy ladies” on stilts.

These elements created surprise, humour and energy, with fans going into the bowl already buzzing. By the final, 42 drummers welcomed the teams, an unforgettable wall of sound that captured the spirit of the tournament.

What lessons did you learn on this project that you would take through to future projects?

This was a wonderful experience that reinforced the importance of agility, collaboration, and shared ambition. The commitment of the teams and volunteers was extraordinary, and the appetite from fans to engage with something new showed us that when you put inclusivity and energy at the heart of the design, audiences will embrace it fully.

For us, the key lesson is to always build in capacity to scale, because when momentum gathers, it’s vital to have the systems and people ready to meet it.