Emilie Musch’s belief in a strong team ethos was forged in adversity as part of a Belgium team preparing to participate in the Dubai Invitational International Sevens in 2015.
The BelSevens were ill-prepared for the competition until Guillaume Mundele was installed as their new coach, just before the team departed for Dubai.
“Before the tournament, we had lost our coach. We had only five or six players coming to training but we really wanted to improve ourselves,” Emilie told World Rugby.
“A few weeks later the men’s head coach, Nicolas Le Roux, was watching us and he told us to come before the men’s schedule to train with him.
“As we were going to Dubai he asked Guillaume Mundele to coach us. When we arrived the team was not good technically or tactically. We had good individuals but no collective.
“During the week before the tournament, Guillaume told us: ‘I’m not technical or tactical. I can’t teach you about Sevens, but I can make a team of you’.
“That year we played in the finals in the Sevens Stadium in Dubai.”
From that unpromising beginning, Belgium’s progress has continued, culminating in silver medals at both the World Rugby Sevens Challenger Series in South Africa in 2023 and the Rugby Europe Women’s Sevens in 2024.
Emilie was a key player in both competitions, but she is now working to develop the next generation of players in Belgium as a coach at the national youth development centre and a recently-qualified physiotherapist.
She is also the first coach from Belgium to participate in the Gallagher High Performance Academy, which Emilie hopes will equip her with some new skills and ideas.
“I want to learn about coaching techniques, planning and leadership,” she said.
“I want to share my experience and listen to other’s experiences. I hope to build some connections and get some feedback from people with high-level experience.”
Emilie lists Le Roux, former England Sevens player Chris Cracknell, Emiel Vermote and Romain Huet as her coaching mentors. As one of the aims of the Gallagher High Performance Academy is to help increase the number of female coaches and other high performance roles at elite level, it may not be long before Emilie becomes a role model herself.
“Most of us are former athletes; we’ve played at the highest level for our own countries and we have built solid experience,” she said.
“It will be disappointing not to use this. It’s important that our knowledge and experiences are shared as coaches, managers, physios or medics at the highest level.
“We know about this sport; we have to share our knowledge.”
