So Close Yet So Far

 
They came so close. Oh ever so close. In fact there were only six points separating the two teams. I'm talking of course, about the sevens teams of New Zealand and my country, Fiji. It also shows that it is indeed possible to have two winners in a sporting event.

Tournament winners - Fiji

New Zealand won the series that spanned nine countries and five continents. They amassed 167 points from the nine tournaments and their star halfback, Tomasi Cama, scooped the International Rugby Board's Sevens Player of the Year Award. Their mastermind of a coach, Gordon Tietjens, was inducted into the IRB Hall of Fame for his services to the abbreviated rugby code.

My countrymen are ruing the missed opportunities in the penultimate tournament that was hosted by Glasgow in Scotland. They were playing so well until they came up against a very determined England side in the Cup quarterfinals. They needed to at least reach the Cup final in order to keep the pressure on New Zealand leading up to the final tournament in London, England. Fiji lost that match 21-26.

Sevens Series winners - NZ

Coming into the London edition of the sevens series, New Zealand skipper D.J. Forbes recognised their need to push on with the intensity:

It's pretty special, we worked extremely hard to get this one and I think everyone knows how competitive the Sevens Series is now. We came here with an 11-point lead but still with an opportunity of blowing it.The quarter-final win was probably our only complete game of rugby this weekend, but there was a lot of passion, a lot behind it to make sure we wrapped up the series.

And win they did. After wrapping up the Series by winning the quarterfinal match comprehensively against South Africa, they met their match against Fiji. The Islanders would go on to meet Pacific neighbours, Samoa in a hard-fought final in which Fiji prevailed. However, by then, the writing was on the wall and New Zealand had scooped the Series title for only the 10th time in the 12 years of the HSBC Sevens World Series. No mean feat, I can assure you.

Had the Fijians reached the final in Glasgow, they would have stood a real good chance of dethroning the champions of sevens. However, kudos to the Fijians for ending strongly and this is a squad, that if kept together over the next four years or so, could be the squad to represent the country at the 2016 Olympics in Rio. Rugby is returning to the menu then and the Fijians will be lokking forward to developing this squad in order to stand a chance of winning an Olympic medal, regardless of the colour.

No doubt, Tietjens has his sights set on Rio 2016 too and has already put into place his plans of conquering that summit. In my opinion, only Fiji stand a solid chance of spoiling that dream of his and relegating the Kiwis to the silver medal. Gold can be ours if we believe and work together.

Bring it on!

Nothing like beating the Poms at home