Scottish rugby star Lisa Thomson inspiring the next generation of girls

Scottish rugby star Lisa Thomson has been inspiring the next generation of girls at a new training session.

The Scottish international returned to the Scottish Borders to help train primary school children.

She reunited with one of her ex-teammates Emily Beattie, who is now a rugby coach, with whom she used to play with at Langholm.

She now hopes that she can inspire the next generation of talented rugby players from the Borders and keep inspiring more girls to take up the sport.

Lisa Thomson was born in Melrose and is hoping there is more emerging talent from the Borders. Credit: PA

She said: "It is good to get along and hopefully show some girls from the Borders that it is possible being from a wee town that you can go on to be a professional rugby player."

Thomson is hoping that women's rugby can emulate the success seen in women's football in Scotland.

She said: “Women’s sport across the board is huge. In rugby it is getting there. It just needs to keep moving as fast as possible to catch up.

"Even women’s football is ahead of women’s rugby at the moment and they are doing things so well. They are selling out stadiums and getting huge crowds everywhere.

"We want to emulate that and inspire young girls along the way as well. The more people who play rugby the better and it will keep building and building from there."

Lisa Thomson captained Scotland at the six nations. Credit: PA

Ms Beattie was delighted that Thomson could come to her training sessions and she believes the experience will be invaluable for the aspiring next generation of rugby players.

She said: "I thought it would be the perfect time to try and get in touch to see if she could come down. It meant the world to them all. They were so excited getting photos and autographs and getting to play alongside her which I am sure they will remember forever.

“It is really important having role models that they can see. For the girls who go to Trinity Primary school that is where Lisa went. Her photo is up and we get to see her everyday in the main hall. To be able to actually meet her and play alongside her would have meant the world to the girls.

“They have seen lots of new faces. Every session there is someone new coming. We also quite often get people asking how they can be involved. It is amazing that it is growing and hopefully we can keep that going.

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