The Springbok Sevens ‘A’ and Springbok Women's Sevens ‘A’ sides delivered good results in Dubai on the weekend, where they participated in the Emirates Dubai 7s International Invitational tournaments.
The men, sponsored by and playing in the colours of Shogun Rugby, won their tournament, while the women finished fourth in their campaign.
The Shogun side, co-captained by Mfundo Ndlovu and Gino Cupido and coached by Sandile Ngcobo, showed good appetite on the outer fields at The SEVENS Stadium, beating all the opponents. They outplayed Oluron (22-7), Monaco Impi's (31-0) and Froggies (17-7) in their pool.
They faced Olorun again in the quarter-finals, winning 36-0 before outlasting Biarritz 24-12 in a hard-fought semi-final. They won their final against English outfit Scimitar Storm by 26-7.
Some of the players in the squad will be drafted into the Springbok Sevens training group for this week's HSBC SVNS Cape Town tournament. SA coach Philip Snyman will announce the final Blitzbok squad for their home tournament on Thursday.
The Springbok Women's Sevens ‘A’ side, fielding seven new players, finished undefeated in their pool, beating Georgia (38-0) and France Military (21-10) before drawing with an Ireland Invitational side (12-12), but a better points’ differential by the Irish pushed them to the top of the pool.
In the playoffs, things went astray a bit. The SA team lost 33-7 to the Spanish side Lionesse in the semi-final, setting up a rematch with the Irish in the bronze medal match.
The South Africans were ahead at the break, but again scores were even at the end of the match. Ireland scored the match-winner in extra time to win 24-19.
The squad returned to South Africa on Monday where they will regroup to face Canada in some warm-up chukkas on Wednesday. The Canadians, a core team in the World Series, will travel to Stellenbosch for the session.
Renfred Dazel’s squad will then have a break and start up again in January to commence preparations for the World Rugby Challenger Series, to be played in March and April.