Blitzboks cruise past Chile into World Cup quarterfinals

The Blitzboks claimed a comfortable 32-5 win over Chile to cruise into the quarterfinals of the Sevens Rugby World Cup at the Cape Town Stadium on Friday night.

Three tries in each half from the hosts was enough to ease past the challengers in their round of 16 match, but it was a brave performance from Chile to keep the Blitzboks in check after a fast start to the game.

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The first five minutes belonged to the Blitzboks, as Chile had no answer to their devastating kicking game with three tries from kick passes.

First Selvyn Davids found his namesake Angelo Davids with a grubber, Ronald Brown then kicked one across field for Sako Makata, and Muller du Plessis did the same for Christie Grobbelaar, as the Blitzboks cruised into a 17-0 lead.

The final two minutes of the half then belonged to Chile as they slowly worked their way into the Blitzboks 22m, allowing captain Joaquin Huici to take a quick tap penalty close to the line and dive over to make it 17-5 at the break.

A Chile scrum off the kick off in the second half then ended in disaster for the South Americans as Brown stole the ball from the scrumhalf and sprinted away to score in the right hand corner.

Chile then enjoyed a good spell of possession, but immense Blitzbok defence kept them in their half, making them try kick ahead, only for Mfundo Ndhlovu to pick the ball up and counterattack down the wing to make the game safe at 27-5 with a minute and a half to go.

A second try for Davids on the fulltime hooter made the scoreline look more dominant than it was.

The Blitzboks now move onto the quarterfinals where they will face Ireland at 10:33pm on Saturday night.

SA women sevens

The South African women’s team were knocked out of the running for the title when they were defeated 29-0 by World Sevens Series runners-up France in their round of 16 clash on Friday evening.

France scored three tries in the first half and two in the second to seal a comfortable win, but the SA women can be proud of a valiant performance that could have been closer if they took their chances.

The SA women now drop into the Challenge Cup where they will face Japan at 10:37am on Saturday.