HSBC Sevens World Series – London Sevens
Wallabies win shock Twickenham title
Australia defeated South Africa in the Emirates Airline London Sevens cup final at Twickenham, claiming their first HSBC Sevens World Series title since 2002.
The Wallabies joyously celebrated their first victory for eight years after seeing-off South Africa 19-14 in a thrilling final.
James Stannard – top scorer in the tournament with 67 points – bagged a try in the final to add to scores from Brackin Karauria-Henry and outstanding forward Henry Vanderglas, while Fabian Juries registered a brace of tries for the Springboks.
The win sees Australia jump to joint-third in the overall standings as leaders Samoa took another stride towards a maiden series win by beating closest rivals New Zealand to reach the cup semi-final.
Stephen Betham’s side have a seven-point advantage over the Kiwis at the summit with only the series finale at Murrayfield to come next week.
His team have beaten New Zealand in each of their six meetings this season and he said: "We have to lift every time we play them – like I said before it is a team you have to measure yourself against.
"We have to do it again next week. Unfortunately we don't have enough points to be relaxed and we have to get up and do it all over again. We don't have an easy pool in Scotland and it looks like it will be quarter finals against New Zealand or South Africa, so just psyching ourselves up from tonight."
Gordon Tietjens’ New Zealand side recovered to win the Plate after Sherwin Stowers’ try after the final buzzer gave them a 26-24 win over Fiji. Continuing the theme of finals going down to the wire, Canada beat Portugal 19-17 to take the London Bowl title and captain Humphrey Kayange's brace gave Kenya a dramatic 24-21 win in the Shield final.
The full results of all matches at the London Sevens are available on the IRB website.
England in London
England disappointed in the defence of their Emirates Airline London Sevens title, going down 17-12 to South Africa in the Cup quarter-final on day two.
Skipper Ben Gollings was yellow-carded early on and the Springboks took advantage to race into a 17-0 lead and tries from Tom Varndell and Tom Powell were too little too late.
Ben Ryan’s side started well on day one with comfortable wins over Russia and Scotland before running into eventual winners Australia, who romped to a 38-5 victory.
Ben Gollings, who top scored for the hosts with three tries and 29 points, reflected that the side didn’t play to their potential.
The all-time HSBC World Sevens Series points scorer said: "It is pretty disappointing. I know we suffered a big loss last night, but we put that to bed and we came out really positive today and still believe we could have done it.
"We came unstuck against South Africa in a pretty frustrating game to be honest. But then pick yourself up against New Zealand, another massive game in a big arena. Credit to the boys they did put it out in that game, but we weren't on the right end of the result and we need to be.
"Hopefully next week we can start where we finished off because that is the level we expect of ourselves against the likes of New Zealand and that has got to happen every game, and it has got to happen if we want to start winning tournaments."
