England have already sold more than 30,000 tickets for their standalone fixture against France at Twickenham in the Six Nations on April 29 as the Red Roses to continue to capitalise on their growing popularity.
Despite the anti-social kick off times, England's route to the World Cup Final in New Zealand caught the attention of the masses with millions following their journey from the UK.
Fly-half Zoe Harrison, who has 46 England caps, only realised the true extent of the support when she returned home and is now delighted to see such high ticket sales ahead of the game against France.
She said: “It's good to see that many tickets have been sold still three months away from the game. We came back from the World Cup and all our families and friends were saying how big the support had been back in England but we couldn't see it as we weren't there.
“We saw some stuff on social media but we didn't realise how much support we'd got because our games were being played at ridiculous hours in the morning. So, to then see we've already sold 30,000 tickets and that we have gained that amount of support is exactly what we want.”
England winger Jess Breach, Harrison's teammate at Saracens, added: “It shows we can sell out big stadiums. As players in the past we've been frustrated that we've been playing at smaller grounds as we've all had friends and family saying I want to come but I can't get a ticket. So, I think it's really good that we're going to big stadiums that can sell 20,000+ and have the ability to get as many people there as possible.”
Harrison stresses the hope that the club game follows suit as, while the international attendances are growing, crowds in the Premier 15s continue to underwhelm.
The 24-year-old hopes for better coverage of the league to capture people's attention and draws a comparison to football's Women's Super League and how last weekend saw Arsenal's game against Chelsea at the Emirates drawing a record breaking crowd of 42,000.
She said: “We don't just want international games to be at that level, we also want our club games to be there as well. We hope for more games on mainstream TV. BBC iPlayer was a big step for us but how can we push to go even further now? Women's football only got the deal to have games on Sky Sports a few years ago, and now they're selling 42,000 tickets for a club game.
“We're not there just yet, but it would be great to have a deal like that. If we get more people watching on iPlayer then someone like BT Sport may be interested to put us on mainstream TV. ”
