IRB 7s: Kiwis limp into play-offs
Sat, 24 May 2008 21:36
Injuries are threatening to derail New Zealand's attempt to seal a seventh International Rugby Board (IRB) Sevens World Series title.
Three key players have been injured and were ruled out of the play-off stages, after Day One of the London leg of the IRB Sevens at Twickenham on Saturday.
While the Kiwis will hope their reserve strength holds up, South Africa - who ended New Zealand's 47-match unbeaten run in Adelaide earlier this year - again look to be their biggest threat.
We bring you the reaction from the locker rooms at Twickenham on Saturday.
Gordon Tietjens, New Zealand coach:
"We had a shocking day today [Saturday], our first two games were quite abysmal and setting the standards we like to set it was pretty disappointing, but it was great to finish with certainly a lot better performance, defensively we played really well. I suppose the performance tonight we will hopefully take into tomorrow, but the first two games were obviously disappointing.
"We started slowly against Argentina and you can never afford to do that, we got punished for a little bit of indiscipline, found ourselves with six men, but only good teams can come back like that to win it at the death.
"We've taken a few knocks mind you, we have got a few injuries and we are trying probably to handle those situations. Ed Cocker has blown a hamstring and is out of the tournament, Solomon King is another one, Zar Lawrence is another one, so it's up to the bench guys really to put their hand up, that is what it is all about."
Paul Treu, South Africa coach:
"I was happy with the first game against France, but I think the second game after we made a few substitutions we lost our momentum a bit towards the end of the game against Spain. What an awesome performance by the guys in the last game against England, it is not every day you are going to play England at Twickenham and to beat them as well. Just for the way the guys performed and the way they have committed to their responsibilities, it was really a good team effort.
"We have set certain goals for ourselves and one of them is we want to win at least two of the tournaments this season. We have won in Adelaide, we are on track now maybe to go all the way in this one as well, but we also know every game from now on is going to be a final so we are just going to take it one game at a time.
"Argentina tomorrow [Sunday] morning is not going to be easy, but it will be awesome if we can go to another final. Argentina are very unpredictable ... it is a game we will have to be focused for the full 14 minutes. We are going to be ready for them and I think we will have to be at our best if we want to beat them."
Ben Ryan, England coach:
"The simple things they [South Africa] did better than we did. They took their chances and were fairly clinical. We are disappointed that we lost to them, but like I told the lads you win the tournaments on the Sundays not the Saturdays. We have got a good side here and we are really looking forward to playing New Zealand in the quarter-finals.
"They are a quality side and Titch [coach Gordon Tietjens] has got them playing a great brand of rugby, but it doesn't really matter who we play, we have shown this year we can play supposedly smaller nations in the quarter-finals and have lost. New Zealand are a good focus for us in the quarter-final, it then gives us perhaps a slightly easier route to the final after that.
"We are not being overly arrogant or anything, we are just looking forward to playing them because we feel we have got a side, irrespective of who we play in the quarter-finals, that are good enough to win this. We have had a reality check [against South Africa], but sometimes retrospectively you can look back and a defeat sometimes does you the power of good."
Diogo Mateus, Portugal captain:
On beating Australia and Canada to reach the Cup quarter-finals: "We came here with no expectations, we just wanted to start with a good game and start evolving from that because we have the World Cup qualifying coming up and we want to get there as best as we can. We brought a very young team, already full of experience but still young, and we just played for the fun, for the team.
"We made a few very good tries and at the end we won the game. I think it was the first time we beat Australia, so you can imagine what we feel at the end winning against one of the big teams, but as you saw in the second game we didn't do so well, but this is Sevens, sometimes you win, sometimes you don't. We are just here to do our best and we hope to get as far as we can."
Stephen Gemmell, Scotland coach:
"Kenya was always going to be a key game. You look at the Pool and without being negative you'd probably say if we play well we'll beat Russia, Samoa if they play how they can then they will potentially beat us and Kenya has always been close. We have played them a number of times over the last two years since I've been involved and we've never beaten them.
"We knew it was a game in which if we could keep structure and we could prevent them from getting into their running, it was built on defence that first game, being able to keep ball and hit shoulders and have people running off. We knew if could get into the tournament with a win it would give us some momentum and we did that.
"I have said all season that we have got a squad good enough to do that [reach a first Cup semi-final] and we have been very close on a couple of occasions. There is no reason why not, we have to believe, we have to turn up and give it our best shot and if we do that then we'll go to Murrayfield on a high."
