Growing up in rugby-mad South Africa, rugby has always been part of Ashley’s life. She now works for a local authority in London, specialising in fraud investigations. She is also a mentor and an Equality, Diversity and Inclusion lead.

She joined Barnes RFC 9 seasons ago and in 2017 led the set up of a Junior Girls’ section to create a player pathway. After gaining her RFU Level 2 Coaching qualification, she supported Roehampton Uni Women’s rugby as a forwards coach then joined St George’s University and Imperial College London Women’s Rugby teams as Head coach.

Staying on with Imperial College, she helped secure back-to-back promotions from Tier 3 to Tier 1 and led the team to victory in the 2022/23 BUCS Women’s South Eastern Conference Cup.

She was awarded RFU England Rugby Universities Coach of the Year for the 2022/23 season and joined Millwall Women’s Rugby as a Guest Coach’ for a few months in August 2022 pre-season and ended up coach the entire season. As her playing career with Barnes winds down, she has now joined the coaching team for the 23/24 season.

After representing Surrey at the first ever Women’s Comp at Vets Fest in 2022 Ashley is now joining Surrey CB. She will work on growing the Women’s game, with particular focuses on increasing player diversity, keeping older players who in the game, and finding ways to expand the level of women’s representation in coaching and refereeing pools within the county.