Sevens beat Welsh

Press, 1 April 1985, Page 44

Sevens beat Welsh

NZPA Hong Kong A New Zealand side that seemed more at home playing soccer than rugby on a slippery Hong Kong stadium pitch, cruised to an easy 260 win over Crawshays Welsh in the quarter-finals of the sevens tournament yesterday. In an upset, the defending champion, Fiji, which trounced New Zealand 26-0 in the final last year, was eliminated by a determined Western Samoan team whose match-turning try came from the former Auckland B player, John Schuster. New Zealand’s semi-final opponent, the Public School Wanderers, beat the French Barbarians 20-4 in another quarter-final. Before the Welsh game, the captain, Wayne Smith, who scored the second of New Zealand’s tries yesterday with a blistering 60 metre run, said he thought the Welsh, who were experienced in sevens, would be very good. Smith said he was pleased with the side’s progress through to the quarterfinals, when it beat Brunei 34-0 and the American Eagles 18-4.

“We didn’t set out to score as many points as we could which is what we did last year and paid the penalty,” he said. The New Zealand side said last year it was exhausted going into the final against the Fijians. The coach, Bryce Rope, described the quarter-final win as “very gratifying.” New Zealand made a fine start when North Harbour’s Franco Botica picked up a ball just before the goal line which Mike Clamp had dribbled for 30 metres down the left flank.

But the Wellington winger hurt his leg when he went down in a heap with a Welsh player as Botica slipped away for the try and Mr Rope was pessimistic after the game about his chances of playing again. “He’s got no feeling from his ankle up to his knee,” said Rope.

“It’s a loss we can’t afford.”