Alena Saili: two Olympic golds, then a Black Ferns return after seven years

When Alena Saili ran on in Lyon on 12 September 2026, it was her first Test for the Black Ferns in more than seven years. In between she had won Olympic gold twice, in Tokyo and Paris, and a Commonwealth Games title on the Gold Coast, all with the Black Ferns Sevens. A week after Lyon she started in midfield in Edinburgh and scored her first Test try with the last play of the game. This is the story of the Southlander who left the fifteen-a-side game at 20 and came back to it at 27.

Porirua to Invercargill

Saili was born in Porirua on 13 December 1998, and Matatū describes her as born in Porirua and raised in Invercargill. Rugby was in the family: her mother played club rugby in Invercargill, and Saili grew up watching her.

At Southland Girls' High School she did a bit of everything. The NZ Rugby Museum profile lists five sports, volleyball, aerobics, basketball, netball and rugby, and she also represented New Zealand at age-group touch. It was only when her coaches sat her down and told her to cut back that rugby became her main sport.

Southland Girls'

She played in the school's First XV from Year 9 to Year 13, and Southland Girls' reached the national finals in every one of those five years. In 2016, her last year at school, they won the national Top Four title for the first time. In the final against St Mary's College of Wellington, Saili scored a hat-trick inside the first 25 minutes and set up another try for her captain before leaving the field injured with most of the second half still to play and the game won. She was named player of the final, and later Southland Secondary Schools Sportswoman of the Year.

Her First XV coach, Nathan Muir, described her in the NZ Rugby Museum profile as "extremely humble and generous with her time", and said the girls at training wanted selfies with her. That same year, sitting in the school gym, she watched the Black Ferns Sevens win silver at the Rio Olympics, which the Southland Tribune reports was an inspiration.

The Black Ferns Sevens

In January 2017, in her first year out of school, Saili was given a full contract with the New Zealand women's sevens team, according to Wikipedia's account of her career. The museum profile notes that she usually played in the forwards in sevens. At the 2018 Commonwealth Games on the Gold Coast she was part of the team that won gold, taking the final 17-12.

Two Tests in a Bledisloe week

Four months later the fifteens selectors called. On 18 August 2018, at 19, Saili started on the left wing for the Black Ferns against Australia at ANZ Stadium in Sydney, in a double-header with the Bledisloe Cup. The Black Ferns, captained by Fiao'o Fa'amausili and coached by Glenn Moore, won 31-11.

She was the first woman from Southland to earn an official Test cap since Jacqui Apiata, the first Black Fern, according to the museum profile. "I told myself I wouldn't cry but I cried the whole time," she told the Southland Times. "I was just playing with my idols the whole time."

A week later she started on the wing again as the Black Ferns beat Australia 45-17 at Eden Park, with her parents in the stand. Playing "in front of my parents at Eden Park made it even better", she told the Otago Daily Times. Then she went home to Invercargill for a short break, turned up at a Southland Girls' First XV training to help Muir, and went back to sevens.

In the middle of 2019 she played three more Tests, all off the bench, at the Women's Rugby Super Series in San Diego: a 35-20 win over Canada, a 16-25 loss to France and a 28-13 win over England. They would be her last fifteen-a-side Tests for seven years.

Tokyo gold

Two months before the Tokyo Olympics, Saili fractured a shoulder at training. She forced her way back into the team, as the Southland Tribune put it, and was in the squad that won gold, beating France 26-12 in the final in July 2021. The museum profile notes that she was used mostly from the bench. She became the second person from Southland to win an Olympic gold medal, after rower Nathan Cohen, and the first Southland woman to do so. She was named Southland Sportsperson of the Year.

More medals followed. Saili was part of the team that won bronze at the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, winning the play-off 19-12 after a 12-17 semi-final loss, and part of the squad that won silver at the Rugby World Cup Sevens in Cape Town that year.

In mid-2023 she went to the United States for about seven weeks to play for Texas in Premier Rugby Sevens, a professional competition, alongside Black Ferns Sevens team-mate Tysha Ikenasio. The Southland Tribune reported that the move cut short a visit home to Invercargill, where she spoke to an Academy Southland function about her journey.

Paris gold

A knee injury cost her much of the build-up to the Paris Olympics, but coach Cory Sweeney named her in the 12 in June 2024. New Zealand won all six of their games, beating Canada 19-12 in the final to defend the title. Saili had won two Olympic gold medals before she turned 26.

Back to fifteens

In 2026 Super Rugby Aupiki moved later in the year, which opened it up to Black Ferns Sevens players for the first time. Nine of them played, and Saili signed with Matatū as a midfield back, registered with Southland. She and Maia Davis made their Matatū debuts against Hurricanes Poua at Maidstone Park on 21 June, as Matatū players No. 67 and No. 68, and Matatū won 18-15. "I'm pretty excited to be able to represent my region again," she said.

The adjustment was mostly in the head, she told the club. "It's definitely more of a mental game now," she said, explaining that in fifteens "you're staying on for the whole 80 minutes" and she was working on staying switched on for longer. She scored in the last round-robin match, a 31-33 loss to Poua, and started on the left wing in the Grand Final against the Blues in Christchurch on 25 July. In the 33rd minute Davis made space for her to score in the corner and give Matatū a 14-7 lead. The Blues came back to win 28-21.

The Black Ferns again

Whitney Hansen named Saili in her 31-player squad for the rest of 2026, listed with Matatū and the Black Ferns Sevens and five caps. She started at second five in the Black Ferns' non-Test match against a New Zealand Women XV in Upper Hutt on 14 August, then went on tour.

In Lyon on 12 September she came off the bench as the Black Ferns beat France 28-14, her first Test since July 2019. A week later in Edinburgh, in the Black Ferns' first Test in Scotland, she started at second five alongside Amy du Plessis. After Layla Sae's second try in the 47th minute the Black Ferns did not score again until the final play, when Saili crossed. Hannah King converted, the final score was 66-14, and Saili had her first Test try.

She was named as backs cover for the Twickenham Test against England, but New Zealand Rugby does not record her as having played. After the northern tour she and Davis left the squad to return to the Black Ferns Sevens.

Standing

Saili's career sits across two codes. Her fifteens record is seven Tests, six of them wins, and one try. In sevens she has two Olympic gold medals, Commonwealth gold and bronze and a World Cup silver. Matatū describes her as a dynamic ball carrier known for physicality and line breaks.

Her own summary of the 2026 switch was simple: a chance to play every weekend, "playing with freedom and having some fun".

What is next

Saili turns 28 in December 2026 and has returned to the Black Ferns Sevens. The Black Ferns fifteens play the Wallaroos at Suncorp Stadium in Brisbane on Anzac Day 2027 and host the British and Irish Lions Women for three Tests in September, the first women's Lions tour. The Olympic sevens tournament in Los Angeles follows in 2028.

Career at a glance

Test figures are New Zealand Rugby's (stats.allblacks.com). She was also named on the bench for the Twickenham Test on 26 September 2026, which NZR does not count as a cap.