Wellington Sevens- day 1 wrap up
Party time in Welli. photo Zoomfiji
NZ pace. photo Zoomfiji
Samoa shell shock after Australia win. photo Zoomfiji
NZ Sevens team? photo Zoomfiji
The singing has not eased up all day, nor has the talent from the athletic men in the IRB Sevens in Wellington.
Day one in Wellington has been a beauty; we have seen upsets and great comebacks to avoid red faces.
In the stands there is an inmate sitting next to a super hero, and a few seats down you have a lady with a mustache and a man in a Geisha outfit! The Wellington crowd is supreme and if there was an Oscar’s nomination for best crowd they would be all over it.
Now back to the matches, Australia have made a bold run on this title easily dispatching Samoa 29-5, to say this was a shock is a huge understatement.
In a super tight tussle Fiji and South Africa ended up 7 all at full time, this gives Fiji top of the Pool, but their unfortunate prize for this is to meet Samoa in the quarter finals tomorrow. To show just how hard this competition is, these 2 teams were in the final last year, now one of them will surely get booted out in this match tomorrow.
In the other top pool matches England easily topped their pool, after sneaking in against the Cooks, everything else they did today was on auto pilot as they navigated through would be tacklers.
In front of an appreciative crowd the New Zealand show rolled on, they played with great width and power to bust out of tackles and march home winners 34-7.
Looking at the Oceania teams, PNG was on fire and narrowly beat Scotland, this is a big scalp for the Islanders and it just shows how much talent is in Oceania. Shane Howarth as coach brings guidance and confidence to these guys and tomorrow they will be hunting for more trophies.
The Tongan’s and Cook Islanders did extremely well and will be feeling mighty unlucky they didn’t beat a big team today, they however will grow from this and tomorrow will look to correct this fortune. They will also be pumped to go come Adelaide when they get the next shot at the big boys.
Overall day 1 has delivered supreme Sevens, we will be back tomorrow and bring you all the news and images. It is sudden death stuff from now on in and Wellington will be rocking all day till the final whistle is blown.
Check out our gallery of day 1 below.