Maddi Levi: ‘I’m not the only one who suffers with self-doubt’ | Jack Snape
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Australian cross-code athlete’s own expectations weigh heavy even as she soars to greater heights as World Rugby’s sevens player of the year. Pressure on Maddi Levi, Australia’s best women’s rugby sevens player, had been building. In a whirlwind four years she had swiftly progressed from D-grade teams in Queensland, through a brief stint in AFLW, to an Olympic Games and recognition from World Rugby as one of the best female athletes in the world.
![[Maddi Levi stands with a rugby sevens ball in Sydney]](https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/3470fcb87f41f1f783bb13626413d5fdcfada497/0_0_2953_1970/master/2953.jpg?width=445&dpr=1&s=none&crop=none)
But as her feats grew, so did her own expectations. Finally, before the first stop of the 2023 season just over a year ago, the tears flowed in a meeting in a Dubai hotel room with the Australian team’s psychologist. “I sat down with him and just burst out,” Levi says. “I just made the [World Rugby] dream team and I got nominated for player of the year, and I felt like there was just so much weight on me to perform and so much weight on me to actually be the difference.”.
![[Maddi Levi scores a try for Australia against South Africa on day two of the Olympic Games]](https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/4b221ff645b2f570e200fcab8514e69e0ea9a0be/0_0_4722_3147/master/4722.jpg?width=445&dpr=1&s=none&crop=none)
Twelve months later, and Levi has reached even greater heights. The 22-year-old has been again nominated for and now won World Rugby’s sevens player of the year award, and finished as the top try-scorer on the circuit and at the Paris Olympics. It has been an astonishing elevation to the highest echelons of Australian sport, but the Queenslander credits her successes to her family, teammates and coaches, choosing self-deprecation at every opportunity. And inside, she jokes she is still far from perfect. “The beauty of the Australian program and having that psych on board is – you don’t actually realise until you start talking about that stuff – like, ‘geez, I’m actually a bit fucked up’,” she says. “You don’t actually realise how many demons you have.”.
![[Maddi Levi poses with a trophy as World Rugby’s women’s sevens player of the year]](https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/0dfc245896df1e19dd78a814a0ac5ca823e4a064/0_0_4796_3254/master/4796.jpg?width=445&dpr=1&s=none&crop=none)
