Blitzboks into Perth Sevens playoffs with a game to spare

The Blitzboks qualified for the knockouts of the Perth Sevens with a game to spare after they picked up two wins on Friday’s opening day of the tournament.

After finishing sixth in Dubai and winning the Cape Town Sevens late last year, the Blitzboks were looking to continue their strong start to the season and try to get ahead of France, Spain and Fiji who are all above them on the World Sevens Series log.

In that respect they got off to the perfect start in Perth, opening their campaign with a 24-19 win over the USA and followed that up with a thrilling 10-7 win over hosts Australia in the day’s final game, to head into day two on top of pool A.

Into the knockouts

The two wins mean regardless of the result of the Blitzboks’ final pool game against Argentina on Saturday morning (7:50am), they will at worst finish as one of the two best third placed teams in the three pools, meaning they qualify for the competition quarterfinals.

In the opening match the Blitzboks got off to a blistering start thanks to tries from Ricardo Duartee and Quewin Nortje putting them 12-0 ahead.

However a yellow card to Impi Visser gave the USA the advantage and they responded with a try to Will Chevalier, as they trailed 12-7 at the break, before a second converted score to Chevalier gave them the lead early in the second half.

Lucas Lacamp dotted down an unconverted try to push the USA further ahead, but the Blitzboks sparked a late comeback as Selvyn Davids and Ronald Brown went over for late scores to seal the win.

Tight affair

In the second match it was an extremely tight affair of few chances, and the Blitzboks will be grateful to have come out on top after trailing at halftime.

Donovan Don scored from off a scrum to give them the lead, followed by Dewald Human knocking on over the try line, which allowed Australia to hit back through James Turner to lead 7-5 at halftime.

Top defence from the Blitzboks in the second half then had the hosts pinned in their own territory, which led to David Brits seizing on a turnover and going over for the games winning try.

The Blitzboks now face tournament defending champs Argentina on Saturday morning, before gearing up for the competition quarterfinals with the first kicking off at 11:27am and the last at 12:41pm.