IRB Wellington 7s

A real day of upsets in Wellington overnight.

Fiji followed their upset 12-14 loss to Scotland with a loss to a pacey Australian side to miss a quarter-final birth for the first time in the history of the IRB 7s circuit, and will take part in the bowl competition.

A sloppy New Zealand were made to look very ordinary by a well-drilled England lineup, losing 14-19, but wins over Spain and a narrow win over USA (who also drew 12-12 with England) see the homeside progress to a quarter-final against Australia tomorrow afternoon.

South Africa needed a count-back to progress to the quarters ahead of Wales and Canada, and will face unbeaten Kenya (who demolished France 24-12, and beat Argentina and Tonga) tomorrow morning

Scotland face England in the first quarter final tomorrow morning, while an impressive looking Samoan side face Argentina.


Going into the tournament New Zealand lead the standings on 60 points ahead of France (46) and Fiji (44)

After Pool play:
Pool A
England 8 points
New Zealand 7
Spain 5
USA 4

Pool B
Kenya 9
Argentina 7
France 5
Tonga 3

Pool C
Samoa 9
South Africa 5
Canada 5
Wales 5

Pool D
Australia 9
Scotland 7
Fiji 5
Portugal 3

Tonight's quarter finals
25. 02 Feb 2013 - 13:00 Spain 0 - 0 Portugal QF Bowl
26. 02 Feb 2013 - 13:22 Canada 0 - 0 Tonga QF Bowl
27. 02 Feb 2013 - 13:44 Fiji 0 - 0 United States QF Bowl
28. 02 Feb 2013 - 14:06 France 0 - 0 Wales QF Bowl
29. 02 Feb 2013 - 14:33 England 0 - 0 Scotland QF Cup
30. 02 Feb 2013 - 14:55 Samoa 0 - 0 Argentina QF Cup
31. 02 Feb 2013 - 15:17 Australia 0 - 0 New Zealand QF Cup
32. 02 Feb 2013 - 15:39 Kenya 0 - 0 South Africa QF Cup

Great day out,going back tomorrow. Standard looks really even, even through an alcoholic haze.

Great quarters

Scot v eng
Nz v aust
Kenya v SA
Arg v samoa

Biggest shock if Fiji's failure to make the quarters

2 things stand out for me with the 7's with the Olympic golds on offer.

First is I can see sides like the US and I guess a combined Great Britain side becoming a real force with the US perhaps targetting their NFL and college sides to put a team together.

The other thing is I believe womens 7's is up for gold as well. After watching the NZ womens sides battle recently there is still a long way to go before they get near the skill levels required to take them seriously. Womens 7's doesnt even exist at international level in any big way and has just started here domestically.

To assign a gold medal to an Olympic event which hardly exists presently I think is undermining the value of the gold medal.

On Wellington, looking forward to today. Didnt go this year- been to several- and they certainly are eventful.

Good to see the lower sides in terms of 15's compete and win well. NZ certainly wont have it all their own way today. Good win for England- we cant beat them at either at the moment!

Olyimpics will be very interesting, I know a lot of money is being ploughed into the game in US at bother codes, with a lot of NFL near misses converting.

A combined british team will be interesting too, but how they will gel noone will know.

Fiji have looked poor so far this year, they only showed patches of this last year. Fiji sevens must be on the way down. Are France actually second? How so, they're a rubbish Sevens team.

Spain have performed well with comments that they now have access to their Olympic funding. An interesting sign of things to come. Its an exciting sport that could hit the mainstream big team sports of football, 15's and in the States grid iron, baseball and basketball.

SA is just useless without Cecil Africa

just realised it was on. Caught the end of the England semi, now NZ and Kenya.....

wow. kenya over nz in extra time. very dramatic.
didn't think kenya was as skillful, but made some breaks.
kenya are good at holding up the runner and not letting him get to ground.

Kenya v England extra time. Roll on the USA when we can get back to the usual commentators rather than these idiot kiwis and their bias and pathetic drivel

England beats Kenya by a hair at the bitter end. The Kenyans played good solid Rugby 7s. Great entertaining final.

Hi ya Doc..Kenya and Canada I thought were fantastic and England did to Kenya what Kenya did to NZ- came from behind to tie and stole it in extra time.

Well deserved for hanging in there. The work they did last two months must have been immense theyve improved so much.

Good day out for all. I'm expecting the world order of 7's to be very different in a year or two. With the ever approaching Olympics choices are going to be have to be made...

When do the four home unions combine and drop out 3 sides in this series- the obvious foundation for the Olympics at least for now.

When do sides start picking their fifteens players?

7's has an exciting future thats for sure. The skills of the Kenyans were right up there with the best I thought.

"When do the four home unions combine and drop out 3 sides in this series- the obvious foundation for the Olympics at least for now".

Well never because Ireland obviously have their own olympic team.

LeinsterFan4life wrote:"When do the four home unions combine and drop out 3 sides in this series- the obvious foundation for the Olympics at least for now".

Well never because Ireland obviously have their own olympic team.

But Northern Ireland, about 2/3rd of the Ulster Branch of IRFU doesn't have its own olympic team, it's part of Team GB & NI. Isn't there a decision, yet to be made as far as I know, whether IRFU would allow some of the players under its jurisdiction to combine with those of three other unions in order to represent their country?

Dubbelyew L Overate wrote:

LeinsterFan4life wrote:"When do the four home unions combine and drop out 3 sides in this series- the obvious foundation for the Olympics at least for now".

Well never because Ireland obviously have their own olympic team.

But Northern Ireland, about 2/3rd of the Ulster Branch of IRFU doesn't have its own olympic team, it's part of Team GB & NI. Isn't there a decision, yet to be made as far as I know, whether IRFU would allow some of the players under its jurisdiction to combine with those of three other unions in order to represent their country?

The decision has already been made and they aren't allowed to play for GB. The Irish olympic team doesn't just represent the South it represents all of Ireland.

Good play from England in parts but still some of the team look out of their depths and the tackling at times was horrible. Also apart from individuals there seems to be no real collective attacking threat.

Oh and Kenya will be wondering why they didn't boot the ball off the pitch when time was up!

yappysnap wrote:Good play from England in parts but still some of the team look out of their depths and the tackling at times was horrible. Also apart from individuals there seems to be no real collective attacking threat.

Oh and Kenya will be wondering why they didn't boot the ball off the pitch when time was up!

yeah the last play before the handover Kenya took it up one more instead of putting it out. Time was just up- literally on full time- but ref had just yelled Use it. We'd already seen ( I think it was England) just kick it out with seconds to go and the ref forced the lineout. Luckily England didnt lose the ball then the match as that would have been the laughing point.(depending on your view of course).

Not sure how and when the Team GB 7s squad will be selected. If I had to guess, it would be right after the regular 7s series is finished that season. I had heard from one of the docs associated with Team GB that the selection process, qualification process and timing is not agreed at this point in time.

I think it will be difficult for a composite team to come together without match time together. There were some early speculative discussons with the Premiership clubs about some match days, but they were only preliminary and nothing remotely concrete yet. And probably not for quite a while to come.

LeinsterFan4life wrote:

Dubbelyew L Overate wrote:

LeinsterFan4life wrote:"When do the four home unions combine and drop out 3 sides in this series- the obvious foundation for the Olympics at least for now".

Well never because Ireland obviously have their own olympic team.

But Northern Ireland, about 2/3rd of the Ulster Branch of IRFU doesn't have its own olympic team, it's part of Team GB & NI. Isn't there a decision, yet to be made as far as I know, whether IRFU would allow some of the players under its jurisdiction to combine with those of three other unions in order to represent their country?

The A decision has already been made and they aren't allowed to play for GB. The Irish olympic team doesn't just represent the South it represents all of Ireland.

Not that it really matters because the physical attributes and training regimes required for 7s and 15-a-side rugby are different, but if a NI player wanted to play for team GB, I suggest that the IRFU may be pushed to enforce any dictat on the BOC. It would inevitably end up at the IOC or the The International Council of Arbitration for Sport (ICAS).

yappysnap wrote:Good play from England in parts but still some of the team look out of their depths and the tackling at times was horrible. Also apart from individuals there seems to be no real collective attacking threat.

Oh and Kenya will be wondering why they didn't boot the ball off the pitch when time was up!

I thought England were worthy winners. The best side there. But, not by much. Kenya could easily have won it. Even if they had let England score out wide rather than tackling I doubt England would have converted.The atmosphere for the final was fantastic.

My thoughts were there is a lot of improvement left in all the sides. I think as the game gets bigger we'll see more angled running and potentially some more kicking. Defenses have definitely improved overall from last time I was there, but there were definitely opportunities if someone can work out how to create a bit of space.

NZ lacked real pace out wide or power through the middle. I thought overall our skill set was noticeably higher than anyone else there but we needed to be far more accurate.

NZ with several key players injured or missing reached the semi-finals,and won the 3rd place play off.No big deal you say maybe for them .BUT they are the only side to reach at least the quarter -final stage in EVERY one this year.So what you say?just this it is as Series decided on a points basis not individual games.
England won this one,Nz the last,Fiji before that and so on BUT who is top of the points table?NZ.
How many Tournament s have Nz lost since this Series began. ONE Fiji winning that.
It is Great that the same sides no longer dominate Fiji,Samoa,Nz,BUT others get a chance.
Kenya have made huge strides and have been there or there about most of the season.

Mr Mackie,

I suspect that the NZ coaches (has Tietjens retired?) will be holding a very vigourous post mortem. To lose to both England and Kenya will have shocked them.

The NZ Press has already had a go it seems Gordon Tietjens is indeed still in control.London Tiger England indeed had a good win both in the pool match and the Final.Kenya winning and losing BOTH the above matches in extra time was a great feat.
England and Nz previously with Fiji,Samoa,and South Africa have in past years won legs.England won Dubai on several occassions, BUT Kenyas emergence as a real threat is relatively new.
BUT my point about overall points is still valid NZ are still well ahead.
Nz press are commenting that some of there leading lights are 29 or30 and maybe past it.Since these include Cameu and D.J.Forbes two of there leading playmakers it sounds ominous.
BUT Tietjens is far more experienced than the press and is building a squad for
the next Olympics 7`s.
On there commonwealth games form would you give big odds against them winning that?

I'm not sure Alan. This is a tournament we really wanted to win. Other teams have had injuries this year. I think the standard is going up. Titch said as much following the tournament. We struggled against the US as well, and Australia has some good players coming in. At some point we are going have to have a team of fully committed sevens players (e.g. DJ Forbes still plays for Counties in the ITM cup). That should give us another step up, as will the lure of the Olympics. But the reality is that game is improving quickly as teams get access to better athletes, money and expertise. One of the key features of this tournament was the competitiveness at the breakdown and defensive alignments.

blackcanelion wrote:But the reality is that game is improving quickly as teams get access to better athletes, money and expertise.

Thats the key for me. When Olympic funding becomes available for 7's for the more established Olympic nations the playing field will be completely different.

And when theres money the Carlin Isles types will flock to the game- a real career option for the NFL fringe type players.

And once they all witness the spectacle at the Olympics at the dizzy accuracy and splendour it will be in 3 years, creating superstars, then find out theres already a global tour for the sport- players and fans will flock and suddenly we will be the also rans as we are in most sports, our current 7's niche, based on the 15's niche, will be diminished.

Frankly Tietjens knows he is sitting on gold for the rest of his career and would command huge bucks as a coach with his experience- you simply cant get better than what he knows about the game- talk of China wanting to hire him as their coach- rumour or not I dont know.

Sonny Bill is even now saying hes dreaming of Olympic gold at Rio. If thats the sort of thinking going on the potential for 7's is MASSIVE...

I agree. I prefer 15's. But 7's has the potential to really impact on 15's and rugby league. If it takes off it's going to be interesting. The reality is it's now an Olympic sport. It's easy set up tournaments and make money. The potential is there to attract athletes and to pay them much more than they currently earn in rugby 15's or rugby league. That will have a significant impact on the IRB. Watch this space....

Yes and the rollercoaster has just started heading to the top for the big ride over the next few years. As the Olympics start getting more focus so hopefully will the 7's. We are at peak in that respect bar being able to draw on the superxv up but anything that makes our game better I'm all for.

Nz dispite injury problems going into the next round have a 21 points lead,the next 3 have differences about one or two points.
Also I read recently in the media NZ ARE going to have a dedicates 7`s squad
managed by Gordon Tietjens.

Everyone has injuries, just one of the facets of the game.

what a headache

methinks the GB 7s should form up two years before the Olympics and be run like a 2year cycle lions tour, with the off two years home nations playing as themselves.

This is unique in the fact that the home nations take this sport seriously enough to compete separately. But whether they do this entirely and contribute to a GB team or only play as nations in 'off' years ...

Big difference for England to have their chief playmaker (and the series' top try scorer last year) Mat Turner back, having broken his ankle in the very first game of the opening round of the series in Australia. He's as critical to the side as Gollings used to be and even though there were several other frontline players injured for this round, he made the difference in England's performance compared to that they offered in the previous rounds without him.