Fiji were crowned champions of the London Sevens for the second year running while the Blitzboks fell at the quarter-final stage.
Fiji won the title after a thrilling 43-7 victory over Australia on Sunday. Meanwhile, South Africa lost to Australia in the last eight.
As well as taking home the coveted silverware, Fiji also celebrated earning qualification to the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games at Twickenham this weekend after guaranteeing a top-four finish on this season’s World Rugby Sevens Series.
The Pacific Islanders will be joined in Tokyo by USA and New Zealand who also booked their spots at the Olympic Games, alongside Japan, who were awarded automatic qualification due to host nation status.
South Africa, who sit in fourth position, will need to take to the field of play at the Paris Sevens next weekend to officially qualify for Tokyo.
Fiji now lead in the standings with 164 points, followed by USA (162), New Zealand (143) and South Africa (131), with this weekend’s hosts England ranked fifth with 109 points.
In front of 85,471 fans across the weekend at a the iconic Twickenham Stadium, Vilimoni Botitu set Fiji off to a flyer and a steal from the restart ended with Aminiasi Tuimaba taking two Australians over the line with him.
Australia simply had no answer to Fiji’s passing with sublime offloading paving the way for Tuimaba to complete his hat-trick before the break.
Joe Pincus gave Australia brief hope but a line-out error enabled Josua Vakurunabili to pile over and restart the procession. Alasio Naduva flew over in the corner then powered through for Fiji’s seventh try of a spectacular finale.
Commenting on his team’s win, Fiji head coach Gareth Baber said: “Obviously, we found it tough in the first four or five minutes when Australia put something in – we knew they’re a good side and a tough side to play against – so we knew that we needed to get some scores on the board, and we did it with some style.”
On back-to-back London Sevens wins and securing Olympic qualification, Baber added: “It’s not just down to the boys and the staff who are here but it’s down to everyone back home in Fiji too. The supporters here have been fantastic all weekend – we thank them all and we hope that they continue to do it.”
Player of the Final Meli Derenalagi commented: “We had lots of work-ons from day one so we tried to improve on day two and our main focus to come and win.
“All the supporters from around the world uplift us and motivate us to come and give our best.”
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Teamtalk
