MADRID (AP) — Fiji reached its first semifinals in the sevens rugby world series since January in the Madrid grand final on Saturday.
The Fijians have gone two years without winning a tournament, but beating Ireland and South Africa advanced them undefeated with rising prospects of a third successive Olympic gold medal in Paris next month.
Fiji will face Antoine Dupont’s France on Sunday and series leader Argentina will play defending series champion New Zealand.
On the women’s side, New Zealand suffered a shock loss to Canada and dropped into a semifinal with archrival Australia. Canada and France play the other semi.
The finals winners will be crowned world series champions.
Fiji rounding into timely form and the return of two-time Olympic gold medallist Jerry Tuwai after a year out don’t appear to be a coincidence.
Back in shape, Tuwai set up their first try against Ireland and scored the second from a stolen lineout. But Fiji’s best try was hatched by Terio Veilawa. Crowded in his 22, Veilawa stepped one defender, chipped another, regathered and kicked ahead and watched Viwa Naduvalo finish off behind the posts.
But Ireland used a Fiji error to score a late try and Hugo Lennox converted from the sideline to force extra time. There, an Irish forward pass gave Fiji a scrum from which Naduvalo scored again for the 26-21 winner.
Ireland hadn’t lost in extra time this season, but lost a second one in a decisive match with New Zealand.
Again, the Irish never led the Kiwis. But they rallied from 17-7 down at halftime to tie the score on a Hugo Keenan try on the hooter. In extra time, Ireland never touched the ball and New Zealand’s Regan Ware scored the 22-17 winning try and eliminated the Irish, the second-ranked team.
That came after New Zealand beat South Africa 33-24 in a madcap game of six lead changes. South Africa was reduced to four players by halftime. With 90 seconds left, Quewin Nortje gave South Africa the lead again. But Moses Leo broke up the middle to score as the fulltime hooter sounded and won it 28-24.
In the other men’s pool, Argentina looked back to its best for the first time in three months as it beat France 26-12 and Australia 14-5.
Dupont didn’t appear against Argentina until France was in a 21-5 hole with about three minutes left. Dupont then spent the next few seconds shadowing Argentina’s own 15s star Rodrigo Isgro. Isgro caught the restart over his head and into the sun, and hared down the right touchline for a brilliant solo try.
Argentina reached its first semifinals since star Marcos Moneta broke his leg in Los Angeles in March.
“We’ve had to change our systems, play a different way,” captain Santiago Alvarez said.
France ensured it was the pool runner-up thanks to the timely introduction of Dupont against Britain. Dupont dumped Robbie Fergusson on halfway and scooted home to force extra time, where he charged from a quick tapped penalty and sent Nelson Epee away on the outside for the 17-12 winner.
Last weekend, Dupont helped Toulouse in 15s win the European Cup title. Asked what its like to be him, he said, “Tiring. I will sleep very well this night, easily, and give everything again tomorrow.”
The New Zealand women, on a four-tournament winning streak, lost to Canada for the first time in eight years, ending a 27-win streak.
Canada won 26-17 after leading 26-0. One of Canada’s four tries was by Olivia Apps, one of the three sevens players who were also in the Canada side which beat New Zealand in 15s for the first time ever only two weeks ago.
Fancy Bermudez, one of those 15s players, said, “That belief will take us far. It’s an unbelievable feeling.”
Canada used that belief again to knock out Britain 22-17 in extra time with Keyara Wardley’s second try of the game.
To advance, New Zealand had to beat the United States by eight points. It won 38-5.
But unbeaten Australia looked imperious as Maddison Levi scored a hat trick of tries against Fiji and four tries against France, a record fourth time she’s scored four or more in series history.
___
AP rugby: https://apnews.com/hub/rugby