Qantas Australian Women’s Sevens fall in Dubai Final

Dec 5 • General News, International • 1090 Views • Comments Off on Qantas Australian Women’s Sevens fall in Dubai Final

The Qantas Australian Women’s Sevens team has finished runners-up in the first leg of the HSBC Women’s Sevens World Series in Dubai in a tough 5-17 loss to arch rivals, New Zealand.

Australia will have the chance to make amends for the Final loss on home soil when the second leg of the Women’s series makes its debut at the HSBC Sydney Sevens in February.

Earlier in the day Australia had accounted for France (44-0) and England (31-10) to progress to the Cup Final.

Qantas Australian Women’s Head Coach, Tim Walsh: “You can’t win games when you miss that many tackles. We had some good things through the tournament but that certainly wasn’t the case after that last game.

“We are going to take a lot out of that. We hate losing and didn’t do ourselves justice (in the final) there.

“We went into that game expecting a far better performance and we didn’t do it and thus didn’t get the result justifiably.

“It was good to see Emma Sykes, she didn’t look out of place and had some really good touches. Tiana Penitani had some turnovers as did Mahalia Murphy which was good to see.”

Australia will next compete at the HSBC Sydney Sevens kicking off on Friday, February 3.

Cup Quarter Final: Australia 42 defeated France 0
Australia started day two in emphatic fashion with a dominant performance against France who was starved of possession and territory. The match started with Emma Tonegato streaking away to score under the posts and then from there it was all one-way traffic. Three tries and a perfect kidding record with the boot by Chloe Dalton gave Australia a 21-0 lead at the break.

The second half, Australia showed their Finals experience to take apart the last remainders of French resistance with tries to Sharni Williams, Emma Sykes and Mahalia Murphy sealing a 44-0 victory for Australia and a Semi Final berth against England.

Cup Semi Final: Australia 31 defeated England 10
An early defensive mistake by the Aussies saw England camp on the Australian’s line for multiple phases. Some great cover defence by Co-Captain Shannon Parry turned the ball over and allowed Charlotte Caslick to find space outside to give Australia a 7-0 lead.

England countered with some strong offloads to keep the Women in Gold’s defence constantly moving backwards to take the score to 7-5. Australia rallied in the back of the first half with an unselfish Tiana Penitani offloading the ball to Emma Tonegato to take the score to 12-5 at half time.

Two tries from Tiana Penitani early in the second half gave Australia a solid 24-5 lead as the reigning World Champions put the old enemy to the sword finishing the match with a try to replacement Mahalia Murphy to take the match 31-10.

Cup Final: New Zealand 17 defeated Australia 5
New Zealand started the match strongly with a try to Captain, Portia Woodman, burning the cover defence on the outside to give New Zealand a 0-5 lead. In a tough battle for the first half, New Zealand made it difficult for Australia to gain possession. The second break from New Zealand extended the Black Ferns lead taking the score to 0-12 at the break.

The second half saw New Zealand continue to apply pressure on the Aussie 7s and with the clock against the squad, Australia allowed errors to creep into the game. Despite a late charge through a try to Emilee Cherry, New Zealand held on to be deserved 5-17 winners.

HSBC Sevens World Series, Dubai, Day 2 results:
Cup Quarter Final: Australia 42-0 France
Cup Semi Final: Australia 31-10 England
Cup Final: Australia 5-17 New Zealand

HSBC Sevens World Series Standings: 1. New Zealand (20 pts) 2. Australia (18 pts) 3. Russia (16 pts) 4. England (14 pts) 5. Fiji (12 pts) 6. Canada (10 pts) 7. France (8 pts) 8. South Africa (6 pts)