Women’s Rugby World Cup final – England vs Canada: What you need to know and how to watch

The 2025 Women’s Rugby World Cup has been the most successful edition of the tournament in its 34-year history.

Attendance and broadcast records have been broken as women’s rugby union has connected with a mainstream audience like never before.

In the first week alone, a record 3.5million viewers watched the opening weekend on French channel TF1, while host nation England’s first pool-stage match against the United States on August 22 was the best-attended Women’s Rugby World Cup match in history, with 42,723 fans at Sunderland’s Stadium of Light in the north east of England.

On Saturday, the tournament concludes with England, the world’s No 1 team, taking on second-ranked Canada in the final at Twickenham, the country’s biggest rugby stadium, in south west London. A sell-out 82,000 crowd is set to be the biggest ever for a women’s rugby match. For comparison, 13,253 fans were at the 2010 World Cup final at a club stadium in the same part of the UK capital.

England, who have won 62 of their past 63 matches, are aiming to win the World Cup for a third time, having been crowned champions in 1994 and 2014. Canada, who lost to England in that 2014 final in France, are looking to crown a remarkable campaign with what would be one of the biggest upsets in sporting history.

Why is Canada’s underdog story so compelling?

Even at the highest level, women’s rugby union is not completely professional. While England’s players are full-time, their Canadian opponents today are not.

This is why, on top of the funding they received from Canada Rugby, the country’s governing body, and World Rugby, the sport’s global governing body, the team set up a fundraiser to help them make it to what is only their second World Cup final.

Named ‘Mission: Win Rugby World Cup’, a million Canadian dollars (£530,000; $706,507) was donated to help the team follow a “world-class plan for training and competition”, and the team has garnered famous fans, too, with singer Shania Twain posting about them on social media.

Should the side known as the Maple Leafs, who are unbeaten in 2025 and have outscored their five opponents 227 points to 50 at this tournament, averaging four tries a game, make history on Saturday, it will be because of their fast and fiery style, which caught defending champions New Zealand off-guard in a 34-19 semi-final victory.

Canada have never won the World Cup, finishing runners-up once and third on four occasions, and have only beaten England three times in 37 meetings, but have shown throughout this competition that they are explosive and creative. In Sophie de Goede, who plays club rugby for London side Saracens in the English top flight, Premiership Women’s Rugby (PWR), they have a world-class forward who has made more ball carries (85) than any other player in the tournament.

Oh you know it did 😍😍😍 https://t.co/Ub0vSX1zow

— Shania Twain 💎💎💎 (@ShaniaTwain) September 19, 2025

Why are England such strong favourites?

England’s women, known as the Red Roses, hate losing and rarely do.

Their most recent defeat was three years ago in the previous World Cup final by New Zealand, when the result was in the balance until the final play of the game. That ended a 30-game unbeaten run, and since that day they’ve broken their own previous record by going 32 matches unbeaten — the longest stretch of any men’s or women’s team in international rugby union.

England have reached the World Cup final on eight previous occasions and were everyone’s pre-tournament favourites to make it to Twickenham today.

On their way to the final, they have scored 283 points and conceded 42 in five pool-stage and knockout games. Many wonder whether the pressure of being such strong favourites might start to weigh on coach John Mitchell’s side, but with a record-setting home crowd cheering them on and a terrific record against Canada (33 wins and only three defeats in the 37 matches), not many would bet heavily against them on the biggest stage of all.

What happened to Ilona Maher and the Americans?

The sport’s very own revolutionary, Ilona Maher will be at the Rugby World Cup final today, but only as a spectator.

Maher has been a gateway to so many people who now watch and play the sport, and while she would have loved to be playing in this final, her United States team did not make it out of a tough group containing favourites England, Australia and Samoa.

Since winning the inaugural competition in Wales in 1991, the U.S. have not missed a World Cup, also reaching the final in 1994 and 1998.

But they opened this campaign with a 69-7 defeat by England, followed that by drawing 31-31 with Australia and then won 60-0 against Samoa.

Exiting the competition after finishing third in Pool A – missing out on the quarter-finals on points difference – has not stopped Maher from enjoying the rest of the World Cup and supporting her fellow players.

This is a historic moment for the sport, eh?

As we’ve said, records have been, and are expected to continue to be, broken at this World Cup.

A record 400,000 tickets have been sold and for a flavour of how many people have been watching the tournament, in the United Kingdom alone, public broadcaster the BBC has said 9.8million people have tuned in to games, with a record peak audience of 3.3m for England’s semi-final against France last weekend. That is the highest viewing figure for a women’s rugby union match in television history in the UK, though it should be beaten on Saturday.

Across social media on the competition’s opening weekend in August, there were 77m World Cup-related video views.

While such numbers are incredible and the World Cup overall has been breathtakingly positive, there is a funding gap between the teams at the top of women’s rugby and those further down the pecking order. More funding, more access and more support will be crucial to ensuring this tournament’s records do not prove to be outliers but will instead be broken at the next World Cup, in four years’ time in Australia, by a game that by then will have a larger global pool of professional players.

What are the line-ups?

One of the best things about rugby union is that, unlike football, coaches announce their starting line-ups in advance of gameday. England are unchanged from the side which beat France in the semis. Scrum-half Natasha Hunt and back-row forward Alex Matthews are the only holdovers from the matchday squad for the victory over Canada in the final in Paris 11 years ago.

London calling 📞🌹

John Mitchell has named his #RedRoses team to face Canada in the #RWC2025 final this Saturday at @allianz_stad.#WearTheRose

— Red Roses (@RedRosesRugby) September 25, 2025

Canada are also unchanged. In fact, this is the same 15 that began their quarter-final against Australia, too. Karen Paquin, 38, is one of those who starts while fellow forward Tyson Beukeboom, one of eight replacements on the bench, featured in that 2014 World Cup final loss to England.

Will this incredible story have the ultimate ending? 🇨🇦#RWC2025 | #CANvENG | #RWC2025Finalpic.twitter.com/dJiz7bucoP

— Rugby World Cup (@rugbyworldcup) September 25, 2025

Ones to watch 

With 15 starters on each team and eight substitutes on the bench, there are many who might light up this final. But two in particular to keep an eye on are World Rugby Player of the Year nominees De Goede, the Canadian No 8, and England’s Megan Jones.

Centre Jones is not only one of the Red Roses’ creative players in the backline but has made eight dominant tackles in the tournament so far and has been crucial to England’s success.

If you are going to be watching the third-place play-off too, which also takes place at Twickenham before the final (12.30pm BST; 7.30am ET), New Zealand forward Jorja Miller will likely stand out against France as she returns after missing the semi-final defeat through injury.

Miller, 21, is also on the shortlist to be the women’s game’s player of the year, as well as being nominated in the breakthrough player category, and the winners of the World Rugby awards will be presented with their trophies on the pitch after the final.

How can I watch the final?

In the UK, the game will be live on BBC One and BBC iPlayer from 3pm BST with kick-off at 4pm (11am ET; 8am PST). Fans in Canada can watch via The Sports Network (TSN). In the United States, you can tune in on Paramount+ or CBS.

Rugby Pass TV will show the final in nations without an active broadcasting rights deal.

For more information on how to watch the World Cup final from your country, there is a full breakdown on the tournament’s official website.

This article originally appeared in The Athletic.

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