SA, NZ to battle for Cup final spot in Vegas
South Africa must overcome powerful HSBC Sevens World Series champions New Zealand to book a place in the USA Sevens Cup Final after both teams advanced to the last four early on Sunday morning. The final knockout matches in Las Vegas are scheduled for late on Sunday evening (SA time).
The Blitzbokke, who are the defending tournament champions in Las Vegas, eliminated Argentina 24-5 in their quarterfinal match after they had won their final pool match 33-5 against France. Samoa got the better of Kenya (19-14) while Fiji edged Wales (12-5) to book their semi-final spots.
Springbok Sevens captain, Kyle Brown, scored his 50th World Series try in his team’s convincing victory over a very physical Argentine side. Steven Hunt, Cecil Afrika and Branco du Preez also scored tries for the Blitzbokke while Argentina replied through Diego Palma.
Brown said afterwards his team was looking forward to play against the Kiwis, who are leading the World Series at the moment.
“Las Vegas is a happy hunting ground for us and we have a very good spirit in our camp. Our keywords the past week have been team work and unity and so I am happy with how things have worked out for us so far. Every Series match is really tough but fortunately this tournament is stretched over three days, which give you a bit more time to recover. New Zealand is the top side in the Series, they play a good style of Sevens Rugby and we are looking forward to measure us against them,” said Brown.
Although SA Sevens coach, Paul Treu, rested several of his regulars for their final pool match against France, the Blitzbokke still managed to win comfortably by 33-5. Mark Richards, Chris Dry, Cornal Hendricks, Brown and Bernado Botha all scored tries for the 2011 Las Vegas winners.
SuperSport will show all matches live from 19h15.
The Cup semi-final line-up for the 2012 USA Sevens:
21:32 New Zealand vs. South Africa
21:54 Samoa vs. Fiji
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