Thirteen for Sydney: the Black Ferns Sevens squad, player by player

The Black Ferns Sevens open their road to the 2026/27 season in Sydney this weekend with a 13-player squad, five of them in the jersey for the first time, and a fixture nobody has staged before: an international sevens match as the curtain-raiser to a Bledisloe Cup Test. Here is the squad, player by player, and why the trip matters.

The games

Two matches on Friday 16 October at the inaugural Kick On Sevens at Woollahra Oval, the Easts Rugby Club's home ground in Rose Bay (8.15pm and 9.45pm New Zealand time), then Australia at Accor Stadium on Saturday 17 October at 4.35pm New Zealand time, before the All Blacks and Wallabies. The matches are not capped. New Zealand Rugby describes them as a crucial part of the build-up to the HSBC SVNS series, which opens in Dubai on 28 and 29 November, then Cape Town the following weekend. Head coach Cory Sweeney said when the fixture was announced that it would be "a special occasion to be a part of the Bledisloe Cup event" and "an opportunity to showcase the game of sevens on one of rugby's biggest stages". The Sydney Test is live on Sky Sport.

Why Australia, again

Nobody else plays these two teams as often as they play each other. All six regular-season finals of the 2025/26 series were New Zealand against Australia: Dubai, Singapore, Perth, Vancouver and New York went to the Black Ferns Sevens, Cape Town to Australia. New Zealand won the League title with 118 points to Australia's 110, then beat them 19-14 in the Hong Kong World Championship opener for a fourth straight Hong Kong title. Australia won the two that followed, a 28-26 semifinal in Valladolid that ended New Zealand's 30-match winning streak, and the Bordeaux World Championship final 26-19 on 7 June. On silverware the year finished one each. Across the season the knockout tally reads New Zealand six, Australia three, and Australia won the last two.

Australia bring a 16-player squad coached by Reg Tayler, with Maddison Levi back after her off-season in the Ultimate Sevens league and Isabella Nasser captaining. Tayler called it "the perfect hit out for us".

Who is not there

Sarah Hirini, who re-signed with New Zealand Rugby to the end of 2028 four months after the birth of her son, is working back to full fitness; Sweeney said she "will be fit and firing for the 2026/2027 World SVNS series". Maia Davis, Justine McGregor and Braxton Sorensen-McGee are with the Black Ferns fifteens for the France series. No official reason has been given for other absences, so none is offered here.

The squad, player by player

Risi Pouri-Lane (captain), 26, from Motueka. Halfback, playmaker and goal-kicker, 143 appearances and 70 tries since her debut in Dubai in 2018, the youngest player ever given a full-time contract in the programme. Olympic gold in Tokyo and Paris, Youth Olympic gold as captain in 2018, the only New Zealander with both. She kicked the winning conversion in the 22-21 New York final in March, was player of the final in Hong Kong, and was knocked out and taken off in the Bordeaux final. Re-signed through the 2028 Olympics.

Jorja Miller, 22, from Timaru, is the player the rest of the world watches. Back-to-back World Rugby Sevens Player of the Year, 118 appearances and 111 tries, re-signed to the end of 2029, Paris gold made her New Zealand's youngest Olympic champion. Player of the final in Dubai, Singapore and Vancouver this year. "I feel like I'm still just scraping the surface," she said when she re-signed; Sweeney said she "has grown a lot as a leader".

Kelsey Teneti, 23, Gisborne-born and Waikato-based. Centre, player of the final in Perth (eight tries at the tournament) and in New York (two tries in the comeback from 5-21 down). Five tries against Canada in Valladolid and the try after the siren in Bordeaux. Olympic gold in Paris.

Manaia Nuku, 24, from Hamilton. Playmaker and kicker, Paris gold medallist, and the comeback of the year: she ruptured an ACL in the Hong Kong final in March 2025, spent 349 days on the injury list, returned in New York this March with a try in her first game, then scored 23 points against Japan in Valladolid, one of the highest single-match hauls the series has seen.

Katelyn Vaha'akolo, 26, from Auckland. Came to union from league and the Kiwi Ferns, was World Rugby's fifteens Breakthrough Player of the Year in 2023, and made her sevens debut in Dubai in 2024. A winger who scores: tries against Argentina, Brazil and Spain in Valladolid and in the corner in the Bordeaux final.

Mahina Paul, 25, from Whakatāne, a Bay of Plenty Volcanix player since 2020. Joined the sevens programme in 2019 after Red Bull Ignite7 and scored on debut in Cape Town. Paris gold medallist; scored in the Hong Kong final this year. Her older sister Mererangi Paul is a Black Fern.

Jazmin Felix-Hotham, 26, from Henderson, a midfielder who plays several roles. Won a national schools sevens title with Hamilton Girls' High in 2017, debuted in Sydney in 2020, was the travelling reserve in Tokyo and won gold in Paris. Her brother Noah Hotham is an All Black.

Olive Watherston, 22, grew up on a farm at Arrowtown and made her Otago Spirit debut at 17. A prop and hooker in sevens and a wing in fifteens, she made her senior sevens debut in the 2024/25 season.

The five first-timers

Renee Holmes, 26, from Gisborne, crosses from fifteens with 33 Black Ferns Tests, a 2021 World Cup winner's medal and a goal-kicker's boot. A fullback and first five-eighth, she played the happiest rugby of her career for the Hurricanes Poua this year, steering them to their first back-to-back wins and equalling the club's season points record after four games. She came into the sevens programme through the development squad at the Coral Coast Sevens in Fiji in January.

Te Pumanawa o Toku Ate Rogers, 19, from Rotorua: Ngongotahā club, two seasons with the Bay of Plenty Volcanix, five sessions a week in the Bay's adult development programme, a teacher aide at Golden Sands Primary, studying sport and human performance, and a trained opera singer. She was selected by the Warriors' under-19 league side and turned it down for this camp. The trip is injury cover and described as a one-off for now. "This opportunity has proved that everything I've poured into this dream is worth it," she said. Her former coach Dave Rewi, after 20 years coaching, said: "I've never seen anyone as fit as her."

Keelah Bodle, 22, from Cambridge. A hybrid player, loose forward or wing, who played three seasons of club rugby for the University of Canterbury while studying, came home to Hautapu and Waikato, debuted for Chiefs Manawa in 2025 and moved to the Hurricanes Poua this year. Her mother, Anna Bodle, played for the Black Ferns and the sevens side.

Sariyah Paitai, a Counties Manukau and Blues back from Wesley College, a New Zealand Under-18 Barbarian in 2023 who scored ten tries in her first provincial sevens tournament. She has also been named in the first New Zealand Under-21 side, which plays Australia in Christchurch on 31 October.

Kavanah Lene, 20, from Christchurch, took the long way round. A Junior Tall Fern and national schools basketball finalist at St Andrew's College, she signed with the University of Montana's Lady Griz as a guard in 2024, came home, went through the Next Ferns national combine and the Coral Coast development squad, and is now in a Black Ferns Sevens jersey. Her mother, Stacey Lene, was a Black Fern from 2003 to 2005.

What to watch

How the new halves pairing of Pouri-Lane and Holmes shares the kicking. Whether Nuku's Valladolid form carries into a full season. And the thing every girl at a Saturday sevens tournament should notice: five of these 13 arrived by five different roads, league, basketball, fifteens, a development squad in Fiji and a Rotorua club side, and all of them are in Sydney this week.