World Cup play-off to close Kennedy career

Who is Scotland's greatest ever rugby player? It's an intriguing question but one with no single correct answer. Any one of my colleague Richard Bath's all-star XV he proposed for the SRU's Hall of Fame a few weeks back would be a worthy candidate, but there was one name omitted from that august list that demands a hearing.

This afternoon Donna Kennedy will earn her 115th cap for the Scotland women's team as they round off their World Cup campaign with a play-off against Ireland to determine seventh and eighth place. It's somehow an appropriate way to finish, ending her career against the same opposition that she started out against in 1993 at the tender age of 20. Now a veteran of 38, this afternoon's match will bring the curtain down on an astonishing career.

"I'm definitely giving up the game, Sunday will be my last ever game of rugby because I am not even going to play for my club after this," Kennedy says with certainty. "I'll have very mixed emotions at the final whistle because I have retired in the past but I realised that I still have something to offer and, as the saying goes, you are a long time retired. I had a little rugby left in me and hopefully I have proved that at this World Cup."

As she says, Kennedy has in fact retired already, not once but twice. She initially decided to step down from the international game after the 2006 World Cup and, after coming back as captain for the ensuing Five Nations, Kennedy "definitely" retired again after the final match of that campaign.

"Obviously I can't be trusted!" she happily concedes.

This time it looks like she means what she says and the highly competitive No.8 will hope to drive Scotland to victory on her last appearance, because there is plenty resting on this match. According to the world's most capped female player, a result against Ireland will be the making of this campaign for the young Scots.

"I think a win against Ireland would make this a successful World Cup," says a player who is famously hard to please. "Looking at the video we were very unhappy that we didn't beat France. We had the game plan but we just didn't execute whereas against Sweden everything worked.

"We lost twice to Canada but while they ran through us in the first game, our tackle count was way down at 68 per cent which just isn't good enough, but at least we made them work for their tries in the second match and, make no mistake, Canada are a very good team."

Hopefully the Scotland women will give their longest-serving member the send-off that she deserves this afternoon but that is presuming that Kennedy doesn't do another about-turn. After all there is one 47-year-old Kazakhstan flanker at this World Cup, so might that persuade the Scot that there is life in the old bones yet?

"Absolutely not!" Kennedy sounds like she means it this time.