Sevens update

This mornings programme did not record so I missed it, as I did the final quarter of last nights game (Eng v Aus). England won that game to top Pool A, which means they went on to face second place of pool D, South Africa. SA had lost to Wales 17-5 and it's being reported as our first win over them in sevens, whereas I thought we last beat them in 2006 or something with James Hook scoring the winning try? I could be wrong though.

Quarter finals:
England 19 - 14 South Africa
Fiji 34 - 10 Samoa

Wales 7 - 17 Australia
New Zealand 36 - 5 Argentina

Plate Semi's
South Africa - Samoa
Wales - Argentina

Semi finals:
England - Fiji
Australia - New Zealand

I'm Welsh, so from my perspective it has been a good year in Sevens. We've introduced a lot of new players and they have showed up very well. We have taken the scalps from the top 5 like England, Samoa, Fiji and South Africa. I would like to see us go a step further and win the series.

Australia are cheats. 5 penalities on the trot, surely it's close to yellow card time.

And as I say that Aus do it again and get a yellow!

Second half and Aus begin by giving away another two penalties. Wales 7 - 5 Austrlia. Not sure if we can hold on to the lead, Australia are very well drilled in defence.

SA has been very poor without Cecil Africa, Boom Prinsloo and a few that are in the junior world cup squad.

No pace, no belief, just pretty poor.

New Zealand only have to make the quarter finals next weekend in London to take out the title.

But for mine the big improvers this year have been England.

England are up and down. I think they missing Ben Gollings and have crazy experiment with Armitage for a while. They struggling to get combinator right. Now they look little bit raw and make too many rash decision on attacking and structure is bent so easy on defending.

My favourite part of entire show this time was the little flick behind the back pass from Fijian (sorry I don't remember the name) to score against England.

BIltong, I see what you mean, just seen that you got nilled by Samoa! http://www.irbsevens.com/destination/edition=10/fixturesresults.html

Hope you aren't looking for excuses for losing to us though, we were missing Harry Robinson, Tom Habberfield and two Owen Williams' .

England will probaly win the tournament next week then, with NZ taking the series. It's been more competitive this year (the Sevens) and has been great to watch. Usual inconsistentcies from Wales sevens have not been so good to watch though.

No excuses, we were $%^&#.

That Samoa is a good team though. And sevens if you don't win a restart can be very long 7 minutes.

Biltong,

Scotland were worse - woeful waste of money for their contracts- still 2 great days out at Scotstoun

Schizoidman, we sucked bigtime mate, without one or two players who make the play and has the pace, the rest are pretty average.

Does anyone know why Cardiff doesn't host a tournament around this time of year? It COULD generate more revenue than it does in Glasgow. Not sure about Edinburgh, why was it not there this year?

A few surprises:
Russia beat kenya,
Samoa beat England,
Fiji beat wales 43 / 7,
Spain beat Wales 22 / 7.

excellant English crowd.

Morgannwg wrote:Does anyone know why Cardiff doesn't host a tournament around this time of year? It COULD generate more revenue than it does in Glasgow. Not sure about Edinburgh, why was it not there this year?

I'm guessing the Scots and English put in a better bid last time around - the IRB only allocates a couple of tournaments to NW Europe, it tries to scatter the 7s circus around the globe.

And in fairness to Scotland they did invent the game.

aucklandlaurie wrote: A few surprises:
excellant English crowd.

Why would that be a surprise?

Fantastic achievement by Spain though to make the 1/4 finals.

London Tiger
If youre going to quote me,then could you please quote me accurately.

excellant to see Forbes go past the 100 try mark.

And why would Cardiff generate more money than Glasgow exactly ?

21st Century Schizoid Man wrote:And why would Cardiff generate more money than Glasgow exactly ?

I'm guessing on crowd numbers? (How big is the ground they played at in Glasgow?)

Anything can generate more money than Glasgow. You going to blame that one on the ref aswell Schizoid?

Too be fair over 103,000 over the two days was pretty good .

Also congratulations to Fiji, If the England 15s side find some try scorers like their sevens team have got then weve all got problems.

aucklandlaurie wrote:
Also congratulations to Fiji, If the England 15s side find some try scorers like their sevens team have got then weve all got problems.

Mathew Tait - transition to 15's didnt quite go to plan although there is always hope

Excellent that the IRB recognise the contribution by Gordon Tietjens and admit him into the IRB hall of fame.

Yeah that's all good, apart from this tournament being the worst one of the year for Wales. Letting in four tries against Spain then Portugal is shocking. Patchell and Fish didn't have a clue how to defend. Richard Smith is a consistent player for us.

When it comes to Sevens in general I'm a big fan of DJ Forbes. I guess I won't be around for much longer though.

I had a great time at 7s. Congratulation to New Zealand for being best consistent team of the year and Fiji for probable having the best team if you understand what I mean about it.

It was great to see such big crowd of people having such good time and enjoying some good weather.

But one thing I can't like is, when start this booing and jeer when some unpopular team score a try? This is not from my understanding of rugby culture. I first heard on TV in Scotland mostly aim at England and I thought maybe I dont hear right. But this week was happen again and I could saw lot of people behave like pantomine when all blacks or australian score the try. I think should support your own team and make a lot of noise, but complain when the oppotision score the try through good work and skill is wrong is in my mind.

Maybe 7s open up rugby spectatorship to new people unfamiliar with the cutlure and they need to be explained how to behave?