Hello everyone and welcome back to another presentation on IN THE WHITE. I hope you all are in good health and looking forward to the festive season ahead of us.
At this moment, I am proud to commence a train of writing series focused on the 2021\2022 world rugby sevens series events.
With 2021/22 season already off and running with a double tournament in Dubai, held on 26-27 November and 3-4 December respectively. It is the south Africa Men’s and Australia Women’s teams who emerged victorious in the two competitions.
For the purpose of this article, I will be focusing on the men’s competition in particular.
So, as I said earlier, South Africa men’s side were victorious in round one and two in Dubai.
They demolished the United States of America (USA) 42-7 in the final of the first round of the competition, after a dominant performance in the group stages with win over Ireland (28-7), Japan (52-12) and Great Britain (31-12).
The team defeated Australia 29-5 in the Quarter final, followed by a 17-7 triumph over Argentina in the Semifinal.
They continued their dominant form a week later, in front of thousands of fans who missed the previous tournament due to COVID-19 restrictions.
The Blitzboks were once again in full force from the start as they beat Japan (48-0), Ireland (21-12) and Great Britain (21-7) in the pool matches.
They overcame Kenya 31-19 in Quarter final and edged France 19-12 in the Semifinal to set an Australia v South Africa cup final.
It was a thrilling finale that finished 10-7 in favor of the Blitzboks, who now see their winning streak extend to 24 matches as the side are unbeaten since Vancouver and Edmonton 7’s tournaments in Canada, which were played earlier this year as part of the 2021 sevens series.
Although semifinal and final victories were by narrow margins for the South Africa 7’s side, player fatigue and mental tiredness does kick in at some point, I believe one has to agree on that, as well as playing back-back weekends are never easy.
Also you cannot ignore the fact that players are humans too, so I think it is natural that they cannot always perform to our expectations.
I see this physical and psychological exhaustion a key factor as to why the Springbok 7’s performance dropped towards the conclusion of the second round of the competition.
Now, this reason does not only apply to one team, but to all the participants. Some may have additional factors to cite. For instance, Fiji fielded eleven new players for the Dubai leg, of which, some were travelling overseas for the first time. So adopting to a new environment and being away from home does have some kind of impact on a player’s mindset and individual performance.
Teams to look out for in Spain
With teams like New Zealand and Samoa returning to the world sevens series circuit in Malaga, Spain next month, after a lengthy skip due to the global Pandemic. It will be interesting to see what these teams have in store.
Team Great Britain will now revert to as England, Scotland and Wales for the remaining series legs after participating as “Great Britain” in 2021 series in Canada and the two weeks in Dubai.
Other teams such as France and Argentina have also been impressive in Dubai by making it through to the cup side of the draw, a rare occurrence from these nations to feature in cup quarters or semi’s.
Talking about rare occurrence, who would have thought a major upset was on the cards in the second week of Dubai 7s as Spain handed Fiji their consecutive defeat of the tournament. Spain’s 33-19 win meant Fiji were out of cup contention following their 22-17 loss to France in the opening pool match.
Coming Up Next
We travel to Spain next month for round three and four of the HSBC World Sevens Series, where Estadio Ciudad de Málaga, Malaga will be the host from the 21st-23rd, then Estadio de La Cartuja, Seville will be the venue for thefourth round a week later.
Till the next time we meet, enjoy the read and take very good care of yourselves. Bye for now.
IN THE WHITE 