Rebecca Mahoney ( Hull, born 25 August 1983) is a former

rugby union Rugby union, commonly known simply as rugby, is a close-contact team sport that originated at Rugby School in the first half of the 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand. In its m ...

footballer and referee. She represented

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

and

Wellington Rugby Football Union The Wellington Rugby Football Union (known as the Wellington Lions for competition reasons) are a New Zealand governing body of rugby union in the New Zealand province of Wellington Region. The main stadium is Sky Stadium (formerly named Westp ...

. She was a member of the

Black Ferns The New Zealand women's rugby union team, called the Black Ferns, represents New Zealand in women's international rugby union, which is regarded as the country's national sport. The team has won six out of nine Women's Rugby World Cup tournamen ...

2006 File:2006 Events Collage V1.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2006 Winter Olympics open in Turin; Twitter is founded and launched by Jack Dorsey; The Nintendo Wii is released; Montenegro 2006 Montenegrin independence referendum, votes to declare ...

and 2010 Rugby World Cup winning squads.

Personal life

Mahoney attended Alfredton Primary School and

Palmerston North Girls' High School Palmerston North Girls' High School is a secondary school for girls, located in the suburb of West End in the city of Palmerston North, New Zealand. Location The main entrance of the school is located on Fitzherbert Avenue, near the Victoria ...

, where she was Dux Ludorum. She currently farms with her husband Luke in the Tararua District, New Zealand.

Refereeing career

Mahoney was a rugby referee in New Zealand. She is the first of two women to be named to the New Zealand Elite Referee Squad. She reffed at the

2018 Commonwealth Games The 2018 Commonwealth Games, officially known as the XXI Commonwealth Games and also known as Gold Coast 2018, was an international multi-sport event for members of the Commonwealth that were held on the Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia, bet ...

and the

2018 Rugby World Cup Sevens The 2018 Rugby World Cup Sevens was the seventh edition of the Rugby World Cup Sevens. Organised by World Rugby, it was held at AT&T Park, now known as Oracle Park, in San Francisco, United States. A total of 84 matches were played over three da ...

. Mahoney was also named to the World Referee Squad and refereed the 2018

World Rugby Women's Sevens Series The World Rugby Women's Sevens Series, is a series of international rugby sevens tournaments for women's national teams run by World Rugby. The inaugural series was held in 2012–13 as the successor to the IRB Women's Sevens Challenge Cup held ...

in Dubai, Japan, Australia, London, and New Zealand. Mahoney's first international referring rugby union test was in Hong Kong. She retired from first class refereeing in 2021.

References

External links

Black Ferns profile
1983 births Living people New Zealand women's international rugby union players New Zealand female rugby union players Rugby union players from Masterton New Zealand women referees and umpires {{NewZealand-rugbyunion-bio-1980s-stub