Leading sides march on in Hamilton, England miss out

Editor 26 Jan 2019 11:13 AM

Four teams move into the Cup quarter-finals with unbeaten records following a high-quality opening day of action at the New Zealand Sevens.

After enthralling competitions in Dubai and Cape Town, every side was eager hit the ground running at the FMG Stadium in Hamilton and particularly fast starts were made by last year’s finalists Fiji and the All Blacks Sevens.

Both progressed out of their pools in impressive fashion scoring 113 and 125 points respectively, meaning that Fiji booked a Cup quarter-final meeting with Canada while New Zealand will take on Australia.

The current world series leaders USA, who lost Perry Baker to a serious injury at the end of their first game, will face Scotland while the defending world series champions South Africa will encounter Samoa in the last eight.

“If we keep on supporting each other and have each other’s backs then we can go far in this tournament,” noted Branco Du Preez afterwards.

“We didn’t have a solid start to kick-off so we just have to focus on the small things that we want to do and take more control of the game. We can take it from there.”

The Challenge Trophy quarter-finals will commence at 10:00 local time (GMT+13) with Argentina taking on Japan, Kenya facing Tonga, Spain meeting Wales and England testing themselves against France.

Day One Results

Scotland 26-21 France
South Africa 29-10 Kenya
England 10-12 Samoa
USA 29-7 Tonga
Australia 17-12 Argentina
Fiji 54-7 Wales
Spain 12-12 Canada
New Zealand 52-0 Japan
Scotland 19-10 Kenya
South Africa 17-5 France
England 36-7 Tonga
USA 34-14 Samoa
Australia 26-5 Wales
Fiji 33-24 Argentina
Spain 22-19 Japan
New Zealand 49-10 Canada
France 15-19 Kenya
South Africa 26-7 Scotland
Samoa 28-12 Tonga
USA 19-7 England
Argentina 36-7 Wales
Fiji 26-19 Australia
Canada 26-0 Japan
New Zealand 24-0 Spain